


Left Behind

by IceQueen1



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Bellamy torture, Bellamy whump, Big Brother Bellamy, Cage tortures Bellamy, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Human Experimentation, Medical Experimentation, Mount Weather, No Romance, PTSD Bellamy, Parent Marcus Kane, Paternal Kane, Post-Mount Weather, Psychological Torture, Torture, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-15
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-24 06:19:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 51,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7497396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceQueen1/pseuds/IceQueen1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alternate version of Bellamy's capture at Mount Weather, and he's there much longer. When he finally returns with the 47 to the Ark's camp, Kane hardly recognizes him...and neither does Bellamy. Alternates between time at Mount Weather and Arkadia. Pike and Jaha have allied with each other as chancellors, and ALLIE doesn't exist. Strictly fallout from Mount Weather and the 47's time there. So far mild descriptions of torture, whump, and Paternal!Kane and Broken!Bellamy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FeatheredFilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FeatheredFilly/gifts).



The scars were the worst. Not because they were more noticeable. Quite the opposite. Thin, professional lines of scar tissue made by a professional hand like spider webs across his tawny skin. Had he been as fair skinned as his sister, one wouldn’t see them at all.

The worst part was knowing that the kid who fell from the sky with a hundred other prisoners, the one that carved a community out of wilderness and _nothing_ , the one that tried to kill the Chancellor all for the love of his baby sister that wasn’t supposed to exist – was _gone_.

Bellamy Blake always had a way of walking into a room like he owned the place. Like nothing could touch him – not that he was in charge, but you should probably listen to him anyway, because otherwise…things could go very, very badly for you. No combat training and a life spent in space, and Bellamy became a general of a child army.

They couldn’t even be called children – these kids, these _delinquents_ , under Bellamy and Clarke’s guidance became _warriors_. The adults looked to them now, not the other way around.

Kane took the blame for what Bellamy had become. He should’ve never allowed him to go to Mount Weather by himself. Yes, Lincoln the Grounder had gone with him, but obviously it hadn’t been enough.

Where once a warrior stood, defiant against the very world itself, existed a wraith. A shadowy existence of the young man who went to war and came back _less_.

When Clarke had returned with all of the kids from the Ark, months after Bellamy left, perhaps a little bruised and definitely scared, the survivors of the Ark had rejoiced. Their children were home. They were _alive_ and they would be families like they weren’t allowed to be onboard the Ark.

Octavia was the first to notice.  

Bellamy wasn’t the one leading them, and it struck Kane as being so horribly out of place that he was positive the kid was dead. There was no other reason for Jasper and Monty to be the ones leading the rescued children home.

When asked, Monty and Jasper looked at one another, sharing a silent look of dread, Octavia had become frantic. Despite her adaptation to the Grounders way of life, she was still seventeen and needed her older brother. He was all she had left.

All Jasper had gotten out was “Miller has him-” and Octavia was off, sprinting for the back of the crowd and shoving her way through them in her rush, sending several stumbling and sprawling.

Kane had to know – “is he dead?” he’d asked quietly.

Monty shook his head mutely, and there was a sudden green tinge to his pale skin as he picked up his pace.

“He would’ve been better off,” Jasper said, and without another word, turned and walked away from him and after his friend.

Monty threw up into the sand until his body shook with violent dry heaves, and Jasper offered nothing more than a supportive hand on his shoulder, rifle still cradled in his other arm.

Warriors. Children. They never balanced well.

Kane fought the urge to run after Octavia. He should tell Abby. He should worry about all of them.

But they all had others to worry about them. Bellamy and Octavia had no one.

He didn’t run after Octavia – but he didn’t walk either.

She’d stopped at the edge of the tree line – just at the shadowy edge of the path the kids had come home on.

Kane’s heart thudded heavily in his chest, and he could feel his throat start to close even as he mentally berated himself. Bellamy Blake was not his son. Octavia was not his daughter. He didn’t even know what happened. But Kane was not a stupid man, and he knew that for Octavia not to run into her brother’s arms, for her to stop so suddenly this far away, there had to be something wrong.

Very wrong.

As he stopped next to her, he put one hand on her shoulder as a comfort. The fact that she didn’t shrug him off was more telling than anything.

That was when he saw them.

Miller was almost carrying Bellamy, walking slow as Bellamy could hardly walk beside him. One arm was over Miller’s shoulder, and the younger boy had his arm around Bellamy’s waist, almost hugging him to his side for support. His clothes hung off of him, like someone had just given him whatever was available because they were sizes too big. He’d dropped noticeable weight – the once rounded features of his face now prominently angled in sharp contrast.

Something was _wrong_. 

“Bell!” Octavia cried, and the shock that froze her in her steps released as she bolted for him.

“Octavia, _wait_!” Miller warned, an edge of panic to his voice that Kane would’ve never expected from the kid. He abruptly stopped her forward motion with Bellamy, making a turn that wasn’t quite quick enough to put him between Bellamy and Octavia.

Too late, Kane realized that Bellamy hadn’t even looked up, hadn’t said a word, and Jasper’s cryptic warning echoed in his memory, and his fingers just missed the back of Octavia’s shirt.

Just like she’d done a thousand times before, whenever she’d needed her older brother, Octavia threw up her arms, about to encircle his neck in a grateful hug and suddenly Bellamy was aware that something was coming towards him and _threw_ himself away from Miller.

He snatched his arm back faster than Kane would’ve thought possible, stumbling away from Octavia like she was trying to kill him, his right leg dragging against the ground – not useless, but not far off.

He caught his damaged leg on a root, and he fell backwards, and even as he hit the ground, he was already scrambling backwards, shoving himself with his good leg and arm, but kept his face turned away, one hand outstretched like a shield until he ran into a tree and stopped.

“Bellamy!” Miller cried out, immediately dropping to his knees in front of his friend. “Bellamy, it’s okay! It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s just ‘Tavia. It’s your sister, Bell, your _sister_ …”

Was Miller _crying_?

Octavia was, even if she didn’t seem to notice, her tears silent as they traced through the dirt smudged on her cheeks. She caught on much faster than Kane – she had her hands up, both of them clasped over her mouth. Whether to keep herself from reaching out for her brother or to stifle her sobs, Kane wasn’t sure.

As his brain caught up to him, Kane suddenly realized that he could only hear Miller, and he could barely hear Octavia’s racking sobs even as she tried to smother them, but he hadn’t heard a thing from Bellamy. Not a whisper, not a cry, not a shout, not a _sound_.

He was _silent_.

“Bellamy?”

He hadn’t really meant to say it. He hadn’t meant to say anything at all, but it just slipped out – his name like a question, because sure he had to be _wrong_. That _couldn’t_ be Bellamy.

But his voice seemed to register on some level that Octavia and Miller’s could not, because Bellamy’s head tilted, listening. He didn’t turn towards him, and he didn’t drop his hand, but Kane could tell he was listening.

Miller heaved a sigh of relief, swiping frantically at his cheeks that looked suspiciously clean – like he’d been scrubbing at them many times before. “That’s Kane, Bell. It’s just Kane and your sister. I swear to you, it’s not Cage. It’s _not_ Cage.”

Cage? Was that a person or a place?

Bellamy remained silent and mostly stilled – though Kane could hear rapid and shallow breathing like a startled rabbit, even if his mouth remained resolutely shut.

Miller waved at Kane, gesturing for him to crouch beside him, just out of arm’s reach of Bellamy.

“Bellamy,” Miller said quietly, steadying his voice. He did it with practiced ease, and Kane didn’t want to think about how many times he’d had to do this for him to recover so quickly. “This is Kane. He’s not going to hurt you.”

He carefully took Kane’s hand, and held it out to Bellamy’s. Not touching, but close enough that he could if he wanted to. Miller gently reached two fingers out, pressing Bellamy’s outstretched hand down to touch the back of Kane’s.

Bellamy almost immediately jerked his hand back, as if Kane’s hand burned his, but Miller caught it gently but firmly, lowering back to Kane’s and holding it there.

“Kane,” Miller repeated, and moved Bellamy’s hand for him. Bellamy’s long, tapered fingers traced feather light across Kane’s skin, so soft it actually sort of tickled but Kane refused to move. “Remember him?”

Kane’s first thought was trauma related amnesia. That Bellamy didn’t remember him. But if that was the case, why was Miller trying to convince Bellamy of who he was through touch?

And that was when he noticed the first scar.

A thin, half-moon shaped pale line that went from the corner of his eyebrow, across his temple and down almost to his cheek.

For a moment, Kane thought he’d caught it on a branch or something, perhaps gotten it in a fight, but then he realized what he was looking it. That wasn’t a wound – it was an incision. Purposely, professionally cut across tanned skin with a steady hand by someone who knew what they were doing.

Abby would be jealous of that incision.

Suddenly Kane understood, in a moment of horrible, terrifying clarity what Jasper meant. Why Monty threw up when asked about Bellamy.

Bellamy wasn’t looking at him because there was nothing for him to see – his visible dark eye roving aimlessly over the landscape

“He’s blind,” Kane whispered in horrified realization. Worse than that, someone had done it on _purpose_ \- sliced through the skin to the optic nerve with surgical precision.

“Not completely,” Miller said firmly. “Bellamy, just look at us. Please?”

It was the _please_ more than anything that seemed to catch Bellamy’s attention, and in a quick, rabbit like jerk, he’d turned to face them.

 _That_ was why he’d turned away from them – he was protecting his one good eye from an unknown threat, and for a brief moment, Kane wished he hadn’t turned.

The look of stark terror had no business being on Bellamy Blake’s face.

“See?” Miller said. “Kane and Octavia. We’re _home_. Just like I promised. Just like _we_ promised.”

Bellamy’s one functioning eye flitted between Miller and Kane and up to Octavia, who hadn’t moved or said another word, and back to Miller. He never said a word, but Kane could hear the question plain as day.

 _Real_?

Hoping he wasn’t about to make it worse, Kane gripped Bellamy’s forearm in a firm, supportive grasp – like ones warriors exchanged when showing respect. “It’s real,” he said, making sure that Bellamy could see and hear his conviction.

And with that, Bellamy crumbled. He squeezed his eyes shut, drawing his damaged leg up to almost his chin as he folded in on himself, his other hand coming up to cover his face. His shoulders started to shake, and it took a moment for Kane to realize Bellamy wasn’t just _crying_ he was _sobbing_.

Without a sound.

Great, heaving gasps shook his thinned frame, but other than the actual sound on inhaling, Bellamy was silent as the grave – but his grip on Kane’s arm didn’t loosen, it instead pulled tight with bruising force with a strength Kane wouldn’t have thought him capable of.

“Jesus, kid…” Kane swore quietly. _What did they do to you_? “Come here,” he said, and pulled Bellamy to him.

The reaction was instinctive, visceral. Bellamy latched on to Kane’s jacket like was a life line, thin and scarred hands clenched so tight the knuckles whitened against the dark fabric and Kane could feel tears seeping through his shirt. Bellamy’s entire frame shook from the force of emotion, but he was still unnervingly quiet.

Without saying a word, glanced over his shoulder at Octavia, and with a quick nod of his head, she was next to him, first cautiously and then like she was afraid to ever let go, grabbed and held on to her older brother.

Miller stood back, not saying a thing.

“What happened, Miller?” he asked, almost whispering so not to disturb the siblings.

Miller’s look was haunted, and he shook his head. For a moment, he thought he wouldn’t answer. But he did.

“You shouldn’t have sent him,” he said. “He shouldn’t have come. Because once they had _him_ …they didn’t need the rest of us.”


	2. Chapter 2

Getting the remaining five hundred yards to the camp was the longest five hundred yards in Kane’s life. It felt more like five hundred miles.

Miller was exhausted himself, stumbling every few steps now that his adrenaline was wearing off. Kane knew that feeling. The end of the mission, home was in sight, and he had fulfilled his promise to his friends. To his family. He’d brought them home, and now everything was catching up. But his father came to greet them at the gate, tears of joy in his eyes at the sight of his son returning home and Miller managed one last burst of energy, running to greet him and flinging his arms around his father.

Kane wanted to be happy – he knew David for years, and knew just how hard this had been for the chief of the guard. All they’d had was Clarke’s promise that they would be returned eventually, but never a time or a place on when exactly that was.

Speaking of Clarke…he could just see her blonde hair in the crowd gathered as the children found their families and their friends, but she strangely enough didn’t come any closer to Bellamy and Kane. From what Kane had been told, Bellamy and Clarke had become co-leaders of the Delinquents, and it struck him as somewhat odd that she wouldn’t want to check up on her friend.

Octavia was reluctant to let go of Bellamy, but Kane managed to appeal to logic. Her difference in height meant that Bellamy had to lean over her for her to support, forcing her to take more than half his weight, and if she stumbled, or he did, sheer physics was going to bring them both crashing down. And Kane seriously doubted Bellamy could take any more abuse.

 Kane, on the other hand, was the exact same height, and if Bellamy fell, he could actually catch him without the two of them falling.

With Bellamy’s arm draped over his shoulders, and one of his arms around Bellamy’s waist, the ragtag group headed for home, Octavia in the lead, even if she kept glancing over her shoulders to make sure the men were still following.

As soon as they crossed the threshold of the camp, the guards rolled the gate closed behind them with a clang, latching shut and suddenly Bellamy was trying to turn around, twisting violently in Kane’s grip until he was practically climbing over top of him to try and get back towards the now locked gate.

“Hey, whoa, wait Bellamy- _Bell!_ ” Kane said, readjusting his grip so he wasn’t in danger of breaking Bellamy’s arm. The kid had managed to spin around so they were almost face to face except Bellamy didn’t even seem to register that he was there at all, shoving his weight back towards the entrance to the camp, forcing Kane to lean forwards to keep their balance.

For being dangerously underweight and seriously injured, Bellamy could still put up a fight, digging in his fingers to Kane’s shoulder hard enough to bruise even through his jacket.

“Unlock the gate!” Jasper shouted, and Kane looked up to see both him and Monty running towards them, full tilt and Jasper waving frantically. “ _Unlock the gate_!”

Monty barreled past the two of them, heading straight for the gate as Jasper slid to a stop in front of the two of them.

“Bell, look at me!” Jasper pleaded desperately, trying to get Bellamy to focus on him. “Bell, _Bellamy_ , come on, man, look at me!” He grasped both sides of Bellamy’s face, barely touching him but from Bellamy’s reaction, he may as well have slapped him. He jerked his face away from the contact, banging his jaw into the side of Kane’s head.

“It’s open!” Monty shouted, and Kane could hear the gate swing open, even over Bellamy’s panicked breathing in his ear. “It’s _open_!”

“Look, Bell!” Jasper said, taking a step back so Bellamy could see the opened gate. “It’s not locked, I promise! You’re not locked in, not anymore, okay? Look! It’s open!”

 _Anymore_? Kane thought. He could feel Bellamy’s struggles slowing, his desperate need to get back to the gate fading with his strength and Kane had about a second’s warning before Bellamy’s leg gave out on him entirely.

The same adrenaline fueled panic attack like in the forest abated, and Kane suddenly had to struggle to hold the kid up before the two of them could fall back into the dirt, Bellamy’s face pressing into the side of Kane’s neck.

“See?” Jasper said, voice soothing, and Kane had to hand it to the kid. From what little he remembered of him onboard the Ark, which was a goofy, aimless jokester, Jasper seemed to have done a lot of growing up on the ground.

They all had. 

Jasper finally came around where Kane could see him, and despite the confidence in the voice he’d just used to soothe Bellamy, the kid was white as a sheet and looked vaguely ill.

“S-sorry about that,” he said, stammering before clearing his throat nervously, wide eyed gaze going between Kane and the back of Bellamy’s head. “You uh, you…” he stumbled over his words, playing with his hands as he tried to speak.

“It’s okay, Jasper,” Kane said, trying to offer a supportive smile. His head still hurt where Bellamy had smacked it with his own, so it probably looked more like a grimace, but at least Jasper stopped stuttering.

“You can’t lock him up,” Jasper said abruptly. “I mean, like, you _can’t_ let him hear it. It messes with his head and he forgets where he is. Just…just, uh, leave the doors open, okay? Or wait till he’s not around to hear it close.”

 _Lock him up?_ Kane’s mind played over the words Jasper had tried to placate Bellamy with.

 _‘You’re not locked in, not anymore_.’

“What happened?” Kane asked, and didn’t care that he sounded slightly desperate because he _was_. “Why doesn’t he _speak_?”

Jasper lost the little color he had, shrugging his shoulder. “I don’t know – h-he’s been like that for weeks, and…” he trailed off, looking the same suspicious green Monty had earlier.

Kane waved him off. “No locked doors. Got it. Thanks, Jasper. I got him from here.”

Jasper took one last look at Bellamy, who had yet to look up or even turn his head, and darted off.

“Come on, kid,” Kane said, giving Bellamy a quick pat on the back of his shoulder. “Let’s get you to Abby. Or at least to a bed.”

He could feel the barest hint of movement from Bellamy as he nodded, one quick downward gesture before trying to push away from the older man, clearly about to attempt to walk again and forgetting entirely that he only had one functioning leg at the moment.

“No, wait – _shit_ ,” Kane cursed as Bellamy’s legs folded under him, dragging them both down.

Suddenly Octavia was there, grabbing onto her brother’s free arm as she ducked underneath it, holding it firmly over her shoulders as she glared at Kane. “What was that about not dropping him?”

“Until he tried to climb me like a tree, I wasn’t doing half bad,” Kane said, smirking grimly as he got his arm back underneath the older boy.

“I think he just called you a cat,” Octavia teased her brother gently, returning Kane’s smirk before she glanced up at Bellamy. “Bell? _Bell_?”

Kane shifted, trying to get a look at Bellamy’s face, but it lolled unresponsively against his chest. With his free hand, Kane put the back of his hand against Bellamy’s forehead and recoiled at the heat he found there.

“Dammit,” he cursed. “Octavia, get Abby. _Now_. Tell her I’m bringing Bellamy to her and he’s burning up.”

“But-”

“I got him,” Kane snapped, harsher then he meant to but worry made him short, and swung Bellamy around again, this time lifting him into his arms with an ease that shouldn’t have been possible for someone Bellamy’s size. He’d lost a _lot_ of weight. “ _Now_ , Octavia.”

She opened her mouth like she wanted to argue, but one quick look at her brother’s face and she nodded, running past Clarke who hadn’t moved during the entire exchange. She stood still, in the middle of the yard, a look on her face he couldn’t quite decipher and didn’t have time to puzzle over.

As he pushed past her, the only thing he said was “You have a _lot_ of explaining to do.”

 *(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*

“Put him there,” Abby said, pointing to the table in the middle of the room. She was rifling through her supplies. “Besides fever, what else am I looking at?”

Kane set Bellamy down at the edge of the table, but as soon as he tried to push Bellamy down so that he was lying on his back, Bellamy came alive, fighting to sit back up. His fingers latched on to Kane’s vest with a death defying grip, tangling in the extra material in his hands before Kane could pry him loose.

Every movement was wild, frantic and disjointed – a combination of flight or flight, raging fever and pure exhaustion but he refused to lay down.

“Kane?” Abby prompted.

“I have no idea,” he answered honestly.

“He’s messed up at least one leg,” Octavia supplied. “It’s not broken, but he can’t stand on it either.”

Oh good. Octavia at least had her wits about her, but Kane was having trouble focusing beyond the fact that he was so far out of his depth that he had no idea what the hell he was supposed to be doing. He didn’t have kids – never did. He wasn’t the type to offer words of comfort, he was the one who pointed out uncomfortable truths. This is what Abby was for. Abby was the mother figure, who held the people together and offered that shield against the world only a parent could.

Yes, Clarke was her only child, but that didn’t mean she didn’t see the rest of the crew as a part of her extended family. He hadn’t even had that kind of relationship with his own mother.

“Talk to him, Kane,” Abby instructed.

 _And say_ what _?_

 Why the hell could he manage this in the forest but not here, when Bellamy actually needed it?

He floundered, wondering what the hell he could do or say when he realized that that Bellamy was shaking. Minute tremors shook his entire frame and for a moment he thought he was seizing…until he heard the chattering of teeth.

“Aw, Christ, kid…sorry about that,” he muttered, glancing around for a blanket. Bellamy’s skin may be hot to the touch, but the air was not, and god only knew how long they’d been walking back through the woods. It was an eight hour walk if you kept a steady pace and were healthy, but in his condition…it could’ve been days, and the weather wasn’t exactly sunny and warm. It’d stayed rainy and overcast in the mid-forties for the better part of a week. 

Prime hypothermia conditions for people in the best of shape, which Bellamy clearly was not.

He rubbed one hand over Bellamy’s back, urging circulation and warmth while he stretched for the blanket folded at the other end of the table.

Bellamy’s grip didn’t loosen or shift, but as soon as Kane leaned away from him trying to reach for the blanket, he pushed closer to him, grip tightening on his shirt.

Kane chalked it up to the need for warmth and carefully draped the unfolded blanket over Bellamy’s shoulders.

Bellamy didn’t reach for it like he expected, instead keeping his death grip on Kane. He didn’t really seem all that aware of what was going on around him, and Kane couldn’t really fault him for that. The same fight or flight adrenaline that got Clarke through the forest carrying him was now abandoning him as well, but the kid still didn’t stop fighting.

The thought hit him like a brick. Even if it was nothing more than physical warmth, he was probably the only thing that Bellamy registered at the moment. Considering what they knew about the Mountain Men, maybe that was a good thing. Maybe the best thing, really. Because for once, Bellamy wasn’t trying to escape from anything.

He was desperately trying not to let go. 

 And so Kane let himself talk. About absolutely nothing at all. It was stupid, empty platitudes, but he kept his voice low and even, letting Bellamy cling to him like he was his only life line in the world, the only tangible connection he had that he had to reality and for all Kane knew, he _was_.

“You’re going to be fine, Bell,” he said, absently rubbing Bellamy’s back. “It’s going to be okay. We got you now, and you’re home. Everyone’s home, and everything is going to be fine.”

From the angle he was at, it was impossible to see Bellamy’s face to judge if he was having any effect on the kid one way or another. With Bellamy’s head pretty much jammed underneath his chin, Kane could hardly look down at all. At least his teeth had stopped chattering, but now he could hear something else, and considerably more worrying.

Bellamy was breathing like a freight train. Every breath rattled deep in his chest, enough that Kane could feel it through both their layers of clothing.

“Hey, Abby,” he called, trying to keep his voice at the same low, even tone. “I think he might have pneumonia…he’s having trouble breathing.”

The doctor grabbed one more thing from the shelves before finally coming back to the table. She raised an eyebrow slightly at Kane, who could only offer a small, one shouldered shrug. “He wouldn’t let go.”

Abby shook her head. “As long as he’s okay, he can stay sitting up, but it’s going to be difficult to get any sort of exam done with you right there.”

“If you can think of a way to get him to let go without breaking fingers, I’m all ears,” Kane said quietly.

Abby set down her supplies, some of which Kane at least recognized.

Unfortunately, so did Bellamy.

(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*

His first mistake was believing the soothing words that promised he was okay. That he was safe.

The second was to allow himself to drift, shutting out the immediate world beyond steady heartbeat that blocked out all the other noises. He was desperate not to lose it, and it was the only thing he allowed himself to focus on. Everything else became unnecessary background that he willfully tuned out.

He should’ve never opened his eyes, but the new voice, the new presence was something that caught his attention and his muddled thoughts couldn’t dismiss as irrelevant. The clatter of metal and glass and plastic was something he learned was never a good thing, and forced his eyes open to his half dimmed world.

Bellamy caught a glimpse of the vacutainer out of the corner of his good eye and he was suddenly off the other side of the table, pushing as far away from it as he could until he ran into something solid. It was instinct. He could move – so he _would_ move. Nothing tied him down this time, no matter how the sensation of leather straps lingered in his memory.

“Wait, Bell…whoa,” Abby said, trying to keep her voice even and low, one hand out and palm open as if that would mean she couldn’t hurt him. 

Somehow being spoken to like a frightened animal made it worse.

Empty hands were meaningless.

“Easy kid,” Kane said from the darkened corner of Bellamy’s vision.

The more they talked the worse it became and their voices overlapped with the memory of Cage and Tsing.

 _Calm down_.

 _You’re going to make this harder on yourself_.

The hand that touched his shoulder wasn’t Kane’s – in his mind it was Cage.

He put his hands up to his ears, trying to block out the sounds as much as the memories, but everywhere he turned to look it was a painfully familiar piece of equipment. It didn’t matter if they weren’t designed to hurt, because they sure as fuck _did_.

His much too big sleeves slid down to his elbows, pooling around the joints as he pulled at his own hair, finger nails digging into his scalp – any sensation to block out the phantom pains of needles and scalpels and the pull of the IV that never seemed to go away.

“Bellamy!” Abby protested, shock and anger coloring her voice and shut his eyes, wishing he could shut his ears against the memory of _one man and one woman in a room covered with medical supplies trying to tell him that_ this wouldn’t hurt.

Unless it was Cage’s off days, and then he was only too happy to tell him that ‘yes, yes it would hurt’. At least those weren’t lies.

“Abby…stop.”

That one word, that one single word made Bellamy look up. Because that word had become a lost one. It held no meaning. No matter how many times he’d said it, no one listened.

But this woman did. Abby, he reminded himself. _Abby_ stopped. Even when he didn’t tell her to, because he hadn’t needed to…someone else did, and she _listened_.

Someone else told her stop and she did.

He couldn’t help the sudden cessation of motion, not even realizing he’d started to rock again as he looked up.

She hadn’t come any closer. She’d actually _backed up._

Kane had moved from the darkened half of his vision to stand next to Abby, his hand on her arm. Both of them were staring at him, Abby open mouthed and Kane’s set in a firm line.

Except…they weren’t looking at his face. They were looking at his arms, and belatedly, he realized _why_. He abruptly lowered his arms, self-consciously pulling at his sleeves until they covered his hands and he shoved them under his arms, hugging them to himself. He could feel his cheeks burn pink and he turned away, forcing the adults into the blackened field of vision.

“Bellamy?”

The voice was quiet, carefully measured and even…and sad.

Cage and Tsing didn’t get emotional. To them, he hadn’t warranted anything resembling care, one way or another. The only time they seemed even remotely human was when Cage lost his temper.

He could hear footsteps – the same, careful measured evenness to them that the voice had. The soft sound of shoes grinding into the floor as someone kneeled down, inches away from him but not an invasive presence.

Yet.

“Bellamy?”

 _Kane_ , he thought viciously. _Kane, not Cage. Kane, not Cage, notCage, notcagenotcage,notcage_. He didn’t even notice that he started rocking again until a hand touched his knee and his head shot up.

Kane was still an arm’s distance away – only the tips of his fingers barely touching him. He held nothing. No collars, no needles, no scalpels.

“Can you show me?” he asked quietly. He gestured towards Bellamy’s arms, still wrapped protectively around his midsection.

It took a moment to process what he said, and even longer for it to register. Kane didn’t move, didn’t push, didn’t try and grab him. He simply held his hand out, an open and silent request instead of a demand. Bellamy risked a glance back at Abby, making sure Kane wasn’t just a distraction, but the doctor hadn’t moved. She stayed back from the table, nowhere near her tools, one hand on her mouth like Octavia had when he saw her in the forest.

For a moment he considered ignoring the request. He didn’t have to give them anything. He didn’t have to answer or show them a god _damned_ thing – and in that same moment, he remembered what happened when you refused a request.

He held one arm out, slowly and tentatively until Kane could reach it if he wanted to.

He didn’t protest when the former councilman hooked a finger around the ragged edge of his sleeve, slowly pulling it back down, heard the sharp intake of air when Kane first saw them.

He didn’t blame him. He didn’t like to look at them either.

Thick, inches wide bruises and scars wrapped around his wrist, still red and raw and deepening purple around the edges, because even when they realized he was slicing through skin to tendons the added padding on the straps only worked so well.

Perhaps if they’d been the only scars, it wouldn’t have been too bad. They were evidence that he fought. That he struggled and did not go gently into that night. That even until the day Jasper pulled him from the cage, he rebelled.

Except they weren’t.

Kane’s fingers continued down and Bellamy forced his eyes shut. He could already feel his face growing hot as he went, fingers trailing over scars new and old and he didn’t want to see his reaction.

He traced over the square inch patch of missing skin halfway down his forearm, healed but sunken in compared to the rest of his arm. The dozen or more tiny circles that dotted his skin with militant precision formation. 

 It wasn’t until Kane pulled his sleeve all the way back to his elbow that the older man even made a sound.

“Abby…” he called over his shoulder, and Bellamy could hear the forced levity in the tone. The one adults used when they were trying not panic children because maybe, just _maybe_ this was something to worry about. “Can you come here for a second?”

Bellamy squeezed his eyes shut even tighter, trying to remind himself where he was and who _they_ were.

“Are these what I think they are?” Kane asked, and the worry in his voice betrayed him. He knew _exactly_ what he was looking at. He was just hoping that Abby would lie to him.

Without conscious thought, he started rocking, seeking comfort in the repetitive motion, softly hitting his head against the metal casing of the shelves. Anything to focus on besides the thought of unwanted hands in unwanted places or the hushed tones categorizing the damage done.

From much closer than the table, he could hear Abby’s response, hear the horror in her voice which was almost worse than the cold detachment of Tsing because it meant that it _was_ that bad. That this was no longer science or medicine, it was _torture_ and he hated it.

“Those are skin graft scars…” Abby said. “ _Jesus_ , Kane, he’s going to need one of his own to repair his wrists. I don’t…I thought Clarke said all they wanted was blood?”

“Apparently, that wasn’t enough,” Kane said, and carefully let go of Bellamy’s arm.

He snatched it back and folded it carefully underneath his other one, pulling the sleeve back down to cover the damage.

 _No, it wasn’t enough_ , he thought bitterly. _Never enough_.  


	3. Chapter 3

“You should really stop that,” Abby admonished lightly.

Kane glanced down and realized he’d started digging underneath his fingernails with his thumb, worrying the skin underneath until it was raw and almost bleeding. It was a habit he’d picked up ages ago, when he was still young and onboard the Ark – it was an unobtrusive way of expressing anxiety whenever he was supposed to be making a speech or a sermon. He’d mostly stopped as he grew older, finding his confidence, but apparently it was not gone forever.

“Sorry,” he said, and shoved his hand underneath his arm. 

Abby waved him off. “Nothing to be sorry about,” she said gently. “But I am fresh out of band aides, so maybe you should find something less personally destructive.”

Kane didn’t really have an answer for that, but found himself glancing back at Bellamy.

The kid was literally _fighting_ exhaustion. His still tapped the side of his head against the metal cabinets, though the pattern was becoming more intermittent as he started to drift.

Both of them had decided it was better just to wait for Bellamy to lose his battle with consciousness before they tried to do anything. Abby was reluctant to cause any more trauma – physical _or_ psychological – and steadfastly refused to sedate him, which Kane was more than happy to agree with.

On the other hand, Kane was fairly positive she hadn’t expected the kid to last as long as he was.

As long as they stayed back, Bellamy retreated to his almost catatonic state – his eyes remained opened, but he clearly wasn’t looking at them. He kept up the repetitive motion, rocking slightly with his arms wrapped around himself, with the _tap, tap, tap_ of his head against the cabinet.  

“He’s doing the same thing,” Abby observed.

Kane glanced over at her and she motioned back to Bellamy. “What?”

“That tapping he keeps doing,” she explained quietly. “It’s a coping mechanism – like you with your fingers.”

Kane sighed, dropping his head onto his arms. “I _want_ to be able to help, but…every time we get closer to him, he freaks out and wakes right back up. I keep hoping he’s going to fall asleep or pass out or _something_ but he doesn’t.”

Both of them glanced back at the door when they heard it open.

They expected Octavia – she disappeared several minutes ago when she realized they weren’t going to be able to do anything for Bellamy without causing further harm.

They didn’t expect Jasper to be following behind her.

Bellamy didn’t really seem to acknowledge either of them, except a slight pause in his tapping. They hadn’t registered as a threat yet.

“Hey, Jasper,” Abby greeted warmly. “Good to have to you back. Can I help you? Are _you_ okay?”

Jasper flashed a brief, nervous smile at her, but shook his head. “Yeah…no, I mean…I’m fine. I just, uh…Octavia asked…” he gestured towards Bellamy.

“I brought him for Bell,” Octavia said bluntly. Her hair, normally twisted back in Grounder fashion, was mostly down now, the dark makeup she wore as a warrior had been wiped clean and she looked almost like the Octavia Blake that was aboard the Ark.

She jerked her head towards her brother, who was now eyeing them suspiciously, glancing between Abby and Kane and Octavia and Jasper.

Jasper’s nervousness seem to evaporate as soon as he saw Bellamy, and a smile spread slowly across his face.

“Hey, man,” Jasper said, and just like that…Kane and Abby ceased to exist for the three kids.

(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(

Jasper wasn’t all that convinced he was the one who should try and talk to Bellamy. Bellamy was much older than he was, and honestly, always a little scary. The only one with any training whatsoever in self-defense thanks to his brief position on the guard, he also had the uncanny ability to gather the rest of the Delinquents as a force to be reckoned with – not to mention that whole trying to kill the Chancellor thing.

On the other hand…he’d meant it when he said he’d come a long way from ‘whatever the hell we want’.

And oh, how far they’d fallen now.

Jasper carefully stepped up to Bellamy, making sure he stayed to his left, keeping in his limited periphery vision.

“Hey, man,” he said, and couldn’t keep the smile off his face. He was just happy to see the older boy _alive_. He dropped down onto the ground, scooting on the floor until he was almost toe to toe with Bellamy, and frowned when he saw the mismatched shoes. “You didn’t find any others?” he asked, grimacing.

Bellamy shook his head, making a hand gesture that Jasper had become all too familiar with.

“Yes, it _does_ matter,” Jasper scolded lightly. “Those don’t even fit, and how far did we walk?”

Bellamy tilted his head up, suddenly finding the ceiling incredibly interesting – not to mention conveniently put Jasper into his blind spot.

Jasper snorted. “Dude, if I walked that far in shoes that didn’t fit, you’d kick my ass. Let me see your feet.”

Bellamy tilted his head back, rocking it slightly forward and Jasper could see the pink flush underneath tanned skin. The drunken movements were one-part exhaustion, but he could see the fever raging there.

“Come on,” he coaxed, tapping the top of Bellamy’s foot. “I’ll even make it easier on you. Just don’t kick me in the face like you did last time.”

Jasper glanced over at Octavia, who had taken up residence just off to Bellamy’s sighted side, sitting quietly with her hands in her lap, open and palms up.

“O thinks you’re going to freeze to death on the floor,” he said conversationally. “And she’s beginning to hover. Do me a favor and let her keep an eye on you before she drives me crazy. Or, like…stabs me or something.”

Bellamy glanced up, as if noticing his sister for the first time.

“Hey, Bell,” she said softly, smiling.

Jasper had forgotten how she looked when she smiled.

“I’m coming over, ‘kay?” she said, and without waiting for an invite, she scooted on the floor until she was almost pressed against Bellamy’s side, putting herself between him and the cold metal of the cabinet. In fairness, as good as the cool metal probably felt to Bellamy’s superheated skin, it was sapping badly needed body heat…which was something Octavia could now offer in return as she pushed herself underneath Bellamy’s arm so that now he had one arm around her shoulder, and she could share core body temperature without it being even remotely related to being in a hospital or medical setting – which meant that Bellamy wouldn’t argue.

In fact, Bellamy seemed to relax fractionally into her, letting his head rest against the side of hers as she pulled the borrowed blanket around the both of them.

Octavia, to her credit, acted as if it was nothing out of the ordinary, and for all Jasper knew – this is what the Blake siblings were like before they got to the ground. She gave an exaggerated shiver, pressing even closer to her brother, and amazingly, Bellamy let her without protest.

Thank you, Octavia.

“We just need some old movies, right Bell?” she joked quietly. “It’ll be just like old times.”

 “Remember, no kicking,” Jasper said, making a V with his fingers and pointing to himself and then back to Bellamy, who gave a tired smirk. “Yeah. Don’t think I forgot how you gave me a black eye. This –” he gestured to his own face, “is the money maker.”

Bellamy rolled his eyes, but he at least finally relaxed enough to stretch out his legs instead of bunching up in a huddled ball against the wall.

“Thank you,” Jasper said, and meant it. He kept one eye on Bellamy, making sure that the older boy wasn’t paying all that much attention to him. He’d been right about Octavia so far – as long as she was close to him, he didn’t acknowledge much else.

Which turned out to be a very good thing.

Jasper winced, hissing softly as he carefully pulled one boot off and saw the damage to Bellamy’s feet.

They’d left the mountain in such a hurry, Bellamy had wound up with pretty much whatever they could find in a rush. Most of the clothes were too big for him, hanging off of him like he was a kid playing dress up, but the only thing they couldn’t find were shoes that fit – these didn’t even match. But they were better than nothing at the time, and Bellamy had been too out of it to care as he and Monty had jammed them on his feet before Miller carried him out.

Now Jasper was questioning the decision. Barefoot might’ve actually been better. The shoes had rubbed all over – biting at the heel and rubbing raw the sides of Bellamy’s feet until they were bleeding.

“Yeah…next time Miller is just going to carry you,” Jasper said, prying Bellamy’s other shoe off. His other foot had fared only slightly better because it was the right one – the one that Bellamy could hardly put any weight on. 

“Jasper?”

He turned quickly, almost completely forgetting that Abby and Kane were still in the room. He’d gotten so used to tuning out the rest of the world any time he was trying to help Bellamy, it had become second nature.

Sort of like Bell and his endless tapping.

Kane and Abby, to their credit, hadn’t come any closer. They had, however, taken note of the fact that both he and Octavia were on the floor instead of looming over Bellamy, and had followed their example.

“Sorry,” he said. “Um, do you think you can find me something with antibiotics?”

“For his feet?” Abby asked, nodding her head slightly at the damaged limbs.

Considering the look she had on her face now, Jasper wasn’t sure if she really wanted to see the rest of Bellamy. His feet weren’t actually that bad, comparably – they just looked worse because the injuries were new.

“Uh…one second…” he said, holding up a finger. He turned back to Octavia, who was absently combing her fingers through her brother’s hair. “Can you keep him calm enough for Abby to come over?”

Octavia shot a quick glance over to the doctor before back to Jasper and mouthed a question: _is he still awake_?

Jasper gave a quick nod, holding up his hand with his fingers mere millimeters apart. _Barely_.

Bellamy had _finally_ started to doze, his eyes staying closed longer and longer every time he blinked. He’d begun to lean heavier on Octavia who hardly seemed to notice when he’d pressed the back of his wrist against the side of her neck where she’d managed to nudge her way underneath.

He might not still be tapping, but he was still looking for that distraction – anything constant that he could focus on that would keep him out of the here and now.

Octavia nodded carefully, before quietly repositioning herself so that Bellamy’s head was at a less awkward angle, pulling him closer to her as she snaked her hand around his other side. For now, it was a comforting gesture, but Jasper knew from experience it could easily become a five point restraint hold.

“Keep his attention,” Jasper told her. “Anything with a predictable rhythm. Humming, tapping… anything like that will distract him.”

Octavia didn’t question it, but she began to hum quietly to her brother, continuing the absent carding through his hair. Jasper idly wondered how often Bellamy had to do that for her when she was younger for her to so reflexively be so good at it, because her brother didn’t resist at all.

He glanced back at the adults, pointing to Abby and gesturing for her to come closer. Honestly, he’d rather have Kane, but he needed Abby’s medical expertise, and as long as Octavia could keep him from noticing it was a woman who approached him, it might not matter.

“Come on,” he said, and patted the ground next to him.

Abby cautiously sat beside him, crossing her legs like he had, every movement quiet, measured, and even. Except for Octavia’s distracting humming, the medical bay was almost silent.

“Bell,” Jasper said quietly, waiting to see if Bellamy even acknowledged him. Octavia was doing her job, and exhaustion was winning out against hypervigilance. Bellamy’s eyes were still opened though – and focused entirely on Abby. “This is Abby. Clarke’s mom. She’s not going to hurt you – or me. Octavia is _right_ there. We’re fine. But you’re not, and you need to let us help you.”

Bellamy frowned, keeping his gaze on Abby. He pulled his feet up and away from her, retreating back into the self-defensive huddle.

He may not talk anymore, but Bellamy could still manage to make a statement – and this one was plain and simple.

 _Don’t touch me_.

Jasper could feel the familiar well of frustration bubbling up, and he angrily swiped at his eyes. He was tired. He was exhausted. He wanted to rest, and find a small, dark hole where he could curl up and finally _sleep_ , but he couldn’t. He owed it to Bellamy to at least _try_ and pay back a part of a debt he was never going to be able to repay. “Bell,” he said, this time more harshly than he intended. “We’re in Arkadia. We’re _home_. You _need_ to let her take a look at you because – _goddammit,_ Bellamy _I_ need her to help you.”

He ignored the sudden sharp jerk of Abby’s face towards him, resolutely holding out his hand for Bellamy. “We’re all safe, Bell. _All_ forty seven of us. Every, single one of us came home. Now…come home, too.”

If Bellamy ignored him, Jasper wasn’t entirely sure he liked his options. That he was going to have to wait for him to actually pass out, or – God forbid – actually hold him down while they sedated him because Jasper was feeling pretty desperate right about now. In the whole ten minutes he’d been here, he’d been watching Bellamy’s face. His fever was getting worse, and despite the fact that he’d come dangerously close to falling asleep in Octavia’s arms, Jasper knew it was because his conditioning was rapidly deteriorating. He could hear the constant rasping in his breathing, could see how chapped his lips were and how his skin had gone papery dry from fever. He may still be awake, but Jasper wasn’t entirely sure just how much or how little of what was going on he could actually recognize and process. 

Desperation won out. Bellamy could hate him later, because right now Jasper just needed him to live.

He shoved Abby, pushing her forcefully to one side so unexpectedly that her hand shot out, grabbing onto Jasper’s sleeve for balance.

 _Fuck appealing to reason_ , Jasper thought savagely. Bellamy had no reason to appeal to, not the way he was right now.

The reaction from Bellamy was almost immediate, so quick not even Octavia managed to hold him back because she was too stunned at the sudden change in Jasper. Bellamy lunged forwards, acting entirely out of the instinct that had gotten him into trouble in the first place – latching on to Jasper’s shirt and pulling him away from Abby.

“Jasper, what the _hell_ -” Octavia only managed part of a protest before he was roughly shoved up against her, pinned between her and the wall and Bellamy, and Jasper knew he was going to be lucky if she didn’t kill him afterwards. It was a risk he was willing to take.

Abby wasn’t Tsing. _Abby wasn’t Tsing_.

Not that Bellamy was going to notice.

He’d done exactly what Jasper knew he would…and shoved himself between Jasper and perceived danger.

Jasper knew it wasn’t Tsing, but Bellamy didn’t. Couldn’t. In his head, he was still back in the Mountain, and someone had come to take away one of the others.

Abby hadn’t even noticed he’d palmed one of her jet injectors and while everyone’s focus was on Bellamy, Jasper pressed it to the side of Bellamy’s neck on his blind side so he didn’t have a chance to bolt away.

It wouldn’t be enough to knock him out entirely, even as sick as he was. His tolerance was high enough now he would need a damn near lethal dose for anyone else if they wanted him truly unconscious, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.

Bellamy collapsed backwards into Jasper’s arms, and he caught him easily.

“I’m sorry,” he said, whispering against Bellamy’s ear. “I’m so sorry. I’m _so_ sorry. I’m sorry. You’ll be okay. You’ll be okay,” he repeated, almost as much for himself as he did for his friend as he smoothed his hair back away from a fevered brow. “Shhh…you’re going to be fine. You’re going to be okay. _Shhh…_ ”

He tried not to think about every other time he’d had to do this. How empty those words had become because he needed them to mean something. He needed them to be true now. He didn’t even care that he was crying, and he let Abby and Octavia slowly lift Bellamy away from him, the fight gone.  

He couldn’t stand to meet Bellamy’s accusatory glare, because worse than accusation was the _understanding_. That Bellamy didn’t blame him and that this was okay because at least it wasn’t Jasper they were taking away.

Jasper flung the jet injector away from him with a frustrated shout, burying his face in his hands. “I had to,” he whispered to himself. “I _had to_. He was never going to give up. I had to. I _had to_.” Saying the words out loud didn’t make them any less hollow.

“Jasper?”

He cracked open his eyes, and saw the worry on Kane’s face even through the blur of tears.

“You did what you had to,” Kane said, kneeling in front of him. “He’s going to okay because of you. You’ve done everything you could.” He patted one reassuring hand on his shoulder, giving him a supportive squeeze. “You brought him home.”

Jasper sniffed, swiping angrily at his eyes. “It’s never going to make up for what he did for us,” he said. He shook his head for emphasis.

“What he did –” Kane repeated, glancing back at Bellamy, who Abby was gently maneuvering on to the exam table with Octavia’s help.

“All of that…” Jasper whispered, “is because of _us_.”


	4. Chapter 4

 

Kane knew better than to push Jasper for more at the moment. The poor kid was already having a bad time of it, and he’d been back in camp for less than an hour. He couldn’t even remember if Jasper had a family left. Were his parents one of the volunteers in section 17? Was Jasper another orphan he’d created?

Monty. Monty would know – except Monty was probably busy with his own family reunion at the moment, if his mother had found out he was alive and returned. He thought he had a vague memory of Jasper being pretty much adopted by the Greens – he even remembered Monty and Jasper being arrested together for the same crime.

Kane shook off the guilt. He could wallow later on past actions – he still clung to the tenuous knowledge that at the time he’d made the best decision he could with the information he had. Three hundred and twenty then…or everyone later. And maybe they would still be dead – they were lucky as many of them survived as they had, crashing a _space station_ into the ground.

From what Octavia described, and what little Kane had seen of Bellamy before he’d taken off to Mount Weather weeks ago – Bellamy shared a similar guilt over those deaths. Maybe worse – Kane had tried to save the majority. Bellamy was only concerned about saving himself when he’d destroyed the radio. Kane wished he’d known the weight of the guilt the kid carried before he’d left on his suicide mission – because then he would’ve recognized the mission for what it was.

A death wish.

One with a possible payout of saving all the Delinquents still trapped there, but even Bellamy had to know that odds of his own survival were slim.

As Abby started her exam, Kane knew the kid had paid for any sins – real or imagined – a thousand fold. Hell, he’d be willing to forgive the kid shooting the Chancellor again.

The sedative Jasper had given him would’ve knocked out someone like Lincoln almost instantly, and kept him down for at least a few hours.

But not Bellamy.

Both dark eyes remained open, even if they were mere slits – and they seemed to roll wildly underneath half-mast lids. Like the kid was still fighting, even through fever and enough drugs to take down someone twice his bulk. That was a hell of a tolerance build up.

 “Can’t you knock him _out_?” Octavia asked, standing back and away from the table, keeping out of Abby’s way. “Wouldn’t that be easier on him? If he didn’t know what was going on?”

“Honey, I don’t think he knows what’s going on _now_ ,” Abby said gently. She gently ran her fingers over Bellamy’s scalp, fingers expertly searching for hidden injuries underneath the dark curls.

Bellamy was apparently at least aware enough of his surroundings to realize it wasn’t Octavia’s hands anymore, and he jerked away, the motion disjointed and delayed.

 “Abby-” Kane said quietly. “Wait.”

She paused, glancing up. He could see her, trying to force away sentimentality – her own emotions towards an injured child, no matter the age, battling with the necessary detachment of a medical professional. She’d been like this for Raven’s surgery too.

“Look at him,” Kane said. “Jesus, _listen_ to him.”

Bellamy’s chest heaved, his breathing coming in quick, panicked gasps – all the more noticeable by the fact that he sounded like a train – a rattling in his chest that sounded thick and suffocating.

And worse was the sudden dampness on his cheeks from slow, silent tears.

He was _terrified_.

He hadn’t even been this bad when they were in the forest.

Because he’d been able to move. He couldn’t go far, but he could still _move_. He might not be tied down, like he’d clearly been before, given the state of his wrists, but this had to be worse. Nothing was holding him down now, and he was still conscious and unable to move.

He moved to step back, away from Bellamy, thinking that his proximity couldn’t be helping if he reminded him of someone on Mount Weather, but as soon as he moved, Bellamy’s hand came up. Uncoordinated and completely lacking in grace, but still reaching.

“Grab his hand,” Jasper said, pushing himself up from the floor. His eyes were still red rimmed and blood shot – but Kane could watch the physical change in him as he swiped a hand across his face. The desperation and frustration that were almost tangible minutes ago were gone, replaced with a sense of purpose, a steely resolve as he moved towards the table.

“He’s looking for you,” Jasper said quietly, gesturing towards Bellamy’s hand which now hung off the side of the table, unable to hold it up. “You’re not going to hurt him – just don’t touch his wrists.”

Kane cautiously reached his hand out for Bellamy’s, and almost as soon as his fingers brushed against Bellamy’s, the kid latched onto him with surprising strength, thinned fingers wrapping almost painfully tight around Kane’s wrist.

Jasper sniffed, dragging a sleeve across his nose before giving a thin, brittle smile. “Like I said…he needs a distraction. Anything with a steady rhythm.”

Kane realized belatedly that Bellamy had latched around his wrist with his fingers over his pulse. “I’m not sure I’m going to be able to keep it _that_ steady…” he said ruefully.

Jasper shrugged, and moved towards Bellamy’s head. “It won’t really matter. As long as you don’t like…die, or something, it’s something for him to look for.”

“I can’t give him any more than what you already gave him,” Abby said. “Any further sedation is going to affect his breathing, and he’s already having trouble, and I don’t have the equipment up and running if I need to intubate him. But I _need_ to see what other injuries he has. Can you keep him quiet? Either you or Octavia?”

Jasper gave a quick, sharp nod. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I can. But there’s a couple things you need to know – you _can’t_ stay on his right.”

Kane moved to pull Bellamy’s hand loose so he could move to the left of Bellamy, but Jasper grabbed onto him before he could. “No, you’re fine. _You_ can stay there. He doesn’t have to see you. He needs to see _her_.” Jasper looked up at Abby, and there was something in those dark eyes. Something _dangerous_. “And you _have_ to talk to him. Not to me, not to Kane – _him_. Not like stupid, empty words, but you have to tell him what you’re doing.”

Abby nodded. “Octavia? Jackson is out with the other kids doing check-ups. Can you help me?”

Octavia looked relieved to have _something_ to do besides stand and worry over her brother, and nodded rapidly. “Yeah. Sure.”

)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*

It was slow going.

Jasper kneeled on the ground with his arms on the table so that his head was next to Bellamy’s almost leaning into him, but not looming over him or impeding his line of sight to Abby as she catalogued the damage. She listened to his instructions on talking to Bellamy as she went, and while it may be helping Bellamy, it wasn’t doing Jasper any favors.

He’d seen the injuries when they were new, fresh and bleeding. He’d dealt with a delirious Bellamy more times than he could count, staying up with him long hours into the night as he tried to keep his nightmares to a minimum or wake him when started screaming in his sleep.

Every scar, every bruise and partially healed bone that Abby found, Jasper couldn’t help the flood of memories that came with every single one.

The fractured ribs from fighting with the guards when he could barely stand, never mind defend himself. The finely sutured incision above his hip bone from when Tsing decided partial cell biopsies weren’t enough – they needed organ tissue. The scar across his temple – they’d actually tried to _repair_ the damage there, but apparently the bizarre and damn near magic effect Bellamy had on the people of Mount Weather didn’t extend to himself. The damage to his eye was permanent, even if it was accidental. There were dozens of them – all with doctor level professionalism, and Abby had to see that.

And Abby Griffin was not a stupid woman. She knew what it meant, at least what it implied, because she was less a doctor and more a mother with every passing moment.

Abby’s breath hitched every once in a while when she came across something particularly gruesome, and it took a moment for her to continue on with her examination.

Most of the injuries were old – partially or almost entirely healed. There was little Abby could do for them now, and even less she was willing to do with Bellamy’s current state.

For the most part, Bellamy offered little resistance, and bless Abby and Kane – as soon as Bellamy _did_ react, they stopped what they were doing. Kane would readjust his grip on Bellamy’s hand, where he’d taken to rubbing circles across the back with his thumb. Jasper wasn’t even sure if he was aware he was doing it, but it was still a rhythmic motion, and served its purpose. Abby only tried for a moment to see the damage to his leg, but Bellamy twisted violently in their grips when he felt her hands on it.

In the end, Abby elected to favor Bellamy’s tenuous mental health over physical well-being. She’d managed to see if there was any heat she could feel through the thin scrub like pants he had on, saw no blood seeping through the fabric, and thankfully opted to leave it be for now.

It was when they had to see his back that Jasper worried, because they couldn’t roll him. It required too many hands and too many people pressed too close to him – not to mention it meant he had to let go of Kane, and Jasper doubted that was happening any time soon.

Octavia was actually the one who offered a solution, pointing out that when they first brought Bellamy in, they actually couldn’t get him to lay down. Instead, he’d clung to Kane like his life depended on it, and Jasper was hard pressed to convince him otherwise.

It had become an almost daily argument in the Mountain– whether Bellamy remembered or not. He was usually returned unconscious, and sometime during the night he would wake up, and usually whatever injuries he’d sustained were worse lying down so he would fight to sit up.

No one out of the 47 had siblings – hell, most of them were the same age. None of them had any experience with trying to console someone, but Jasper at least made the attempt. For all that Bellamy gave up, Jasper was willing to sacrifice a bit of his soul to make sure Bellamy got to keep part of his, too. So when the older boy woke up from pain in the dead of night, Jasper would hold him upright until they both managed to fall into a fitful sleep propped against each other.

Before they came for him again.

“Jasper?”

He blinked looking up and realized they’d been trying to talk to him for a minute. “Huh?”

Kane smiled patiently and repeated the last question. “Do you think he’d be okay sitting up for us to get a look at his back?”

Jasper nodded, trying to rub the almost sleep from his eyes. Had it been hours? Or had it been days? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually been able to sleep. “Yeah,” he said, yawning, and trying to cover it with one hand. “He’s actually probably going to prefer it.”

“Would it be better for me to do this, or you?” Kane asked.

Jasper glanced at his hand, which Bellamy still had a firm death grip on. Judging from Kane’s white knuckles, he didn’t plan on letting go any time soon, either.

Jasper shook his head. “You’re taller. And heavier. You’re going to have to support his whole weight and I don’t think I can anymore.”

With careful hands, the adults managed to maneuver Bellamy up into a sitting position. There was a brief debate on whether or not Kane should sit on the table with him, or let Bellamy hang his legs off the side, but ultimately the table proved too narrow for two adults, and Abby needed to be able to see without it in her way.

Jasper almost laughed, instead hiding his grin behind one hand as he watched Kane readjust his grip on Bellamy. Bellamy acted more drunk than sedated, but since he lacked the strength to hold his own head up, his chin was digging into Kane’s collarbone where it rested. To keep his arms out of the way of Abby’s exam, they’d carefully maneuvered them over Kane’s shoulders, and honestly, it looked like Bellamy was a little kid that had stayed up to late and his dad now had to carry him home. It wasn’t funny, not really. It was actually kind of endearing. Jasper knew Kane had no child of his own – and without siblings on the Ark there was no such thing as being an uncle or an aunt, so if you didn’t have close friends with kids…you didn’t have any experience at all.

Kane had just as little experience as any of the other Delinquents – possibly less, because the man had always been a loner onboard the space station, which meant he likely didn’t have experience with having to comfort other people either.

Bellamy was polar opposite – he’d been a father figure to Octavia since the day she was born. He’d helped raise a kid since he was a kid himself. Maybe that was the reason he literally latched on to Kane. The one kid with experience with raising kids, and the one adult with none whatsoever.

Or Jasper’s sleep deprived brain was drawing connecting lines where there were none.  

Abby swore when she lifted Bellamy’s shirt, seeing the massive bruising for the first time.

“Oh my _God,_ ” she repeated as she pulled it up even further until it was almost to his shoulders. “Christ, how did he manage to get this far? Did you carry him?”

Jasper shook his head, and realizing that Abby wasn’t looking at him, he answered out loud. “No. We couldn’t. If Miller tried to carry him, or any of us, we couldn’t do it without hurting him, so Miller pretty much dragged him the whole way.”

Bellamy’s back was a _mass_ of purple and black and blue and faded sickly green and yellow. None of the guards were very happy with him when they found out he’d killed one of their own and took it out on him whenever he was in transit and they didn’t think Cage or Tsing were looking.

By far more concerning was the deep, violent shaded purple area on his lower spine.

“Jasper…” Abby said, and he could hear the effort she made in trying to keep her voice even. “Did they do a _lumbar_ _puncture_ on him?”

Honestly, Jasper had no idea what had been done recently. Bellamy’s inability to speak meant their limited ability to care for him was gone because they didn’t know what they were trying to fix. He shrugged. “Probably.”

Abby let her fingers trail up his spine, her lips pressing into a thin, bloodless line by the time she’d gotten to his shoulder blades. “If I ever get my hands on these people…” she let the threat hang. She probably didn’t know what she would do.

Jasper had a few good ideas though.

Abby pressed lightly near the edge of the dark black area on his lower spine and Bellamy’s entire body shuddered.

“Sorry,” she hissed, but didn’t move her hand away. “I know this has to hurt, Bell, but I need to confirm a theory.”  She pressed down slightly harder on the bruise and it was like she’d shock lashed him, his entire body arching away from the touch and almost entirely into Kane’s arms, throwing his head back and biting his lip hard enough to draw blood.

“What did you just do?” Kane demanded, struggling at having to suddenly hold Bellamy’s entire weight. Bellamy couldn’t fight thanks to the drugs, but that also meant he couldn’t stand. If hadn’t already been leaning into the older man, he would’ve been face first on the floor. “His heart rate just sky rocketed.” He didn’t add that there was a fresh bout of tears either.

It wasn’t that Bellamy had suddenly become a weeping wreck of a human being. In fact, he’d mostly been the opposite their entire time in the Mountain. But like it or not, it was still a reflexive reaction to extreme pain.

Abby gritted her teeth. “I think they messed up a spinal tap – only one, but they did it several places. Three of them – up near his shoulders are infected, which is what I think is causing his fever. The lower one…the one I just barely touched, I think it’s a spinal hematoma.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Octavia demanded.

“It can mean a lot of things, none of which are good. It means somebody fucked up – and he’s been bleeding into an epidural space, which is putting pressure on the nerves in his spine. It’s probably why he can’t use his leg – all the nerves in his lower back are being compressed and causing pain and partial paralysis. I’m surprised he can move as well as he can.”

“Which means?” Octavia prompted again. “Can you fix it?”

Abby bit her lip, worrying the skin between her teeth. “I can try. At worst, he’ll wind up like Raven and probably need help to support that leg. At best, he’ll get most of his feeling and motion back. Depends on how long and how much damage there is.”

“Does that mean surgery?” Kane asked.

When Abby nodded, Jasper jumped to his feet. “You can’t do that – not yet! The amount of crap you’re going to have to give him to knock him out is probably going to kill him!” He gestured at Bellamy who was still hanging almost dead weight in Kane’s arms. “That’s what he’s like on a dose that would drop _Lincoln_.”

“Raven survived without anesthesia,” Octavia pointed out, though she cringed even as she said it.

“No _fucking_ way are you cutting into him without sedation!” Jasper shouted, slamming his hands into the table, making everyone jump. “Not a _fucking_ chance! Not after all the shit they did to him while he was still awake! I couldn’t stop _them_ from torturing him, but I can sure as shit stop _you_! Over my _dead body_!”

The door to the infirmary crashed open, two armed guards from the security team bursting in with their guns half raised, looking for the source of the shouting.

Jasper couldn’t help the ingrained response from Mount Weather, flinching hard and ducking his head away from the guards.

Neither could Bellamy – and apparently no amount of sickness, injury or enough drugs to drop a horse could stop it. Before any of them really had a moment to realize what was happening, Bellamy grabbed the pistol Kane carried in a side holster and fired two rounds at the guards.

Abby couldn’t help the small scream of surprise, and Kane snatched the gun back – tossing it onto the table where Octavia grabbed it.

Bellamy had missed – missed by a mile. From the lack of screaming, Jasper assumed the shots that went almost into the floor hadn’t even hit someone by accident outside.

But from the looks on Abby and Kane’s faces, Jasper guessed it didn’t matter.

Those were the looks people gave to someone on their way to be floated.

What the hell was going on in the camp?

“What the hell is going on in here?” someone demanded, mirroring his own thoughts.

A third person shoved their way between the two guards, who still looked undecided whether or not they were supposed to be arresting someone. He looked vaguely familiar, and it took a moment for his brain to supply a name.

Pike. Earth skills teacher.

And apparently the guy in charge, judging from the way Abby and Kane exchanged worried looks.

“Who fired first?” Pike demanded, glaring at the small crowd.

Apparently the rush of adrenaline Bellamy needed to pull a gun on security was the last of his reserves, because suddenly he pitched forwards, legs giving out entirely and falling dead weight into Kane.

“ _Finally_ ,” Jasper breathed. And his brain decided now was a good time to check out too, because later, he wouldn’t remember a damn thing after that.


	5. Chapter 5

_Six Weeks Ago in Mount Weather_

 

“Come on guys, pick up the pace – I don’t know how long we have before they change their minds,” Jasper said, shifting nervously from foot to foot. He _wanted_ to believe that President Wallace would keep his word about them being able to leave, but Jasper knew enough about politics to know even Wallace was worried.

Maya had already said that there was something going on. A shift in the dynamics of the mountain, decidedly in the favor of Cage over his father. The others may not know _exactly_ what went on in the chamber, what they were using the kids for, but the lure of possibly being able to walk outside for the first time in their lives was too good to look too closely.

If they didn’t leave soon, there was a good chance they weren’t leaving at all.

And they still needed to find Harper and Monty. He was not about to leave without his best friend, and Harper was one of the 100. They were family. They were _blood_.

The dormitory door hissed open, and when Jasper turned and saw a guard with Maya coming in, his hand reflexively tightened, never imagining he would ever wish he kept a sword.

But Maya didn’t look nervous – not like she would if the guard was sent here to take another one of them, and one guard wouldn’t come alone. They would know that would never work.

And actually, now that he really _looked,_ there was something very familiar about that guard.   

Jasper couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

“ _Bellamy_?” he hissed.

The guard’s head came up, face barely visible under the hat pulled low over his eyes. Familiar dark eyes and a cautious smirk greeted him, even as Bellamy’s _very_ recognizable voice said “I leave you alone for ten minutes, and you get kidnapped by hill folk.”

Leave it to their fearless leader to paraphrase a TV show older than the Ark as words of inspiration.  

“Thank _God_ ,” Jasper said, breathing a sigh of relief, and before Bellamy could protest, Jasper gave him a quick hug – and just like the last time, it took a minute for Bellamy to react enough to awkwardly pat one shoulder.

“Good to see you too,” he said gruffly.

Jasper felt like a terrible weight had been lifted. President Wallace had given them permission to finally go home – to go back to their own people, and now Bellamy was here. “What are you doing here? And what happened to your face?” Jasper frowned, looking the other boy up and down. One eye was turning black and blue, his lip split down the middle, and he could see bruising starting to darken across his face.

“Bellamy?” someone echoed in the crowd.

“Bellamy’s here?”

“Bellamy!”

The cries went up like a chorus from the crowd as they abandoned their frenetic packing, and Jasper could hear the same relief he felt in their voices.

Miller pushed through the crowd, looking happier than Jasper could ever remember seeing the boy before. “Is it true?” he asked. “Is the Ark on the ground? Did they survive?”

Bellamy smiled briefly, pulling at the split in his lip. “Yeah. Yeah, they’re on the ground. Your dad says hi and to get your ass back home.”

“Wait…what are you even doing in a guard’s uniform?”

“Long story,” Bellamy said, waving off an explanation, glancing around at the gathered crowd. “You guys look like you’re already packing. What happened? The message we got didn’t make it sound like you were exactly free to leave. And where’s Monty?” Then, after a beat, “and Harper?”

Jasper blinked, surprised that one, Bellamy could do a head count that fast, and two, could tell who was missing. “I don’t know – they’ve been taking us-”

“To a harvest chamber?” Bellamy asked sharply. “People in cages?”

“Um, yeah…” Jasper said, floundering to keep up with him. “How do you know about the harvest room?”

“That’s how I got in,” Bellamy said. “Lincoln got me to the tunnel where the Reapers drop off their prisoners, and some woman tagged me for Harvest. Maya got me out of there.”

Something in Bellamy’s voice was off. A certain tightness that usually meant that he was purposely avoiding a whole answer. Part of his story was true, but Jasper had a sneaking suspicion it didn’t go down exactly as he described.

“What’s changed?” Bellamy repeated.

Jasper shook his head, not entirely sure himself. Cliff note version it was. “President Wallace said we could go – his son, Cage, and the woman who chose you for Harvest is a doctor, Tsing. They were running experiments on us, something about radiation and our immunity, or-or our ability to filter it or something like that – but then they started taking some of us, like Harper and I haven’t seen Monty, and something’s gotta be going on, something bad, because Wallace told us to leave. Grab everything and go.”

Bellamy glanced around again, and Jasper could see him mentally calculating how he was going to get forty-five delinquents out of the mountain without being noticed, and still manage to go looking for the missing two.

“You think you can get them out of here?” Bellamy asked.

Jasper almost shook his head, but stopped halfway – that was _exactly_ what he’d been about to do before Bellamy showed up. If he could get the others out, then Bellamy would be able to look for Monty and Harper.

He nodded, one quick, decisive movement. “Yeah,” he said, sounding much more confident than he felt. But he wasn’t about to let Bellamy down. He wasn’t going to abandon his responsibility to his friends, to the rest of the 100. He could do this. He _would_ do this, no matter how much he really, really wanted to just hand over everything to Bellamy because Bellamy was better at this and probably didn’t feel like his heart was going to explode out of his chest and his hands weren’t shaking from adrenaline.

“Good,” Bellamy said, and Jasper could see the relief in his eyes, and it suddenly occurred to Jasper than Bellamy was honestly concerned he would refuse, which meant he would’ve had to choose between saving forty-five, or risking looking for the missing two with the rest of the 100 in tow. “You get them out, I’m going to look for Monty and Harper.”

“Wait, you mean they weren’t in with you?” Jasper said. “You didn’t see them at all?”

Bellamy shook his head. “Only Grounders.”

Maya suddenly piped up from Bellamy’s side, and Jasper was slightly ashamed he’d almost forgotten she was there. She was unusually quiet. “Harper and Monty wouldn’t necessarily be in with the Grounders. That’s not where they take them for blood donation.”

“Do you know anywhere else?” Bellamy asked. “Anywhere they could be keeping them?”

Maya’s beautiful face twisted into a grimace as she wrung her hands together nervously. “Maybe. I can help you look though – I at least know how to get around, and I can help you avoid the others.”

Bellamy nodded. “Good idea. Maya, you come with me, Jasper, get the others out. You know where the exit is?”

Jasper nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I know how to get them out. You go. I got this.”

He should have known it wouldn’t be that easy. Because when had _anything_ ever gone well for them?

As soon as Bellamy and Maya turned to leave, warning klaxons started to blare.

“Something’s wrong,” Maya said, and even as she said it, Jasper knew she meant something _besides_ what was already wrong. That wasn’t the sound for a radiation breech. It was something else.

The doors to the dormitory started to close, and faster than Jasper would’ve thought possible, Bellamy shoved Maya out of the dormitory. It was close enough that he almost got his hand caught between the doors.

“Do _you_ know what’s going on?” Jasper asked. Because Bellamy was sure as hell _acting_ like he knew.

“I can guess,” Bellamy said darkly, eyes darting around the dormitory for another exit, or maybe some place to hide.

They could hear running feet outside – whatever those warning sirens were for, it was big. It sounded like the whole Mountain was panicking.

“Maya’s smart enough to get away, right?” Bellamy asked. “She’s not going to be stupid and hang around outside the door, is she?”

Jasper shook his head mutely, wondering what the hell was going on. Ten seconds ago, they were going _home_. They were going to find Monty. Things were going to be okay.

And suddenly it was like his brain kicked into overdrive. That same surge of adrenaline that took over when they were last outside, surrounded by hundreds of blood thirsty Grounders who wanted them dead, that enabled him to do the impossible came flooding back.

“Get out of the uniform,” Jasper said. “Get out of it now.”

To his credit, Bellamy didn’t argue, and immediately started stripping off the vest.

“Miller, grab him clothes,” Jasper ordered, and Miller scrambled back to his bunk. Thank God they were at least close in size, because there was no way someone Bellamy’s build was going to fit into something that fit Jasper. 

In moments, Bellamy was in Mount Weather clothes, but they still had the problem of the fact that he looked like hell.

Maybe it would be enough though. Maybe whatever the hell was going on didn’t necessarily mean that they would come to the dormitory, and they wouldn’t have to worry about hiding an extra person in a mountain where everyone knew everyone.

“How did you get the guard uniform, Bell?” Jasper heard Miller growl.

“How do you think?” Bellamy snapped.

Miller swore quietly.

Well, that explained how Bellamy knew what the alarms were likely for.

“Wait, if you were taken in with a bunch of Grounders, what are the odds they know you’re one of us?” Miller asked. “Will they be looking for a Grounder, or an Ark kid?”

 “Depends on how much credit they give to Grounders,” Bellamy said dryly. “The guard I got the uniform from seemed surprised enough.”

“Maybe they won’t come here?” someone spoke up hesitantly.

“And if they do?”

“Do _not_ let them find Bellamy,” Jasper snapped savagely. “On your word as the 100, do _not_ let them know about him. He’s our only Ace in the hole right now, and if they find out he’s in here, and if they find out what he did to _get_ in here, he’s done. _We’re_ done, because then they’re gonna know that people can sneak in, and security is going to be a thousand times worse and we’re never gonna get out of here.”

Bellamy frowned. “Don’t get yourselves in trouble over me. If they come for me, then let them – I can convince them I didn’t purposely let myself get captured. Reapers grab anyone they can.”

“Bellamy, shut up, okay?” Jasper said, desperate to try and get Bellamy to understand. “You don’t know where they’re taking people. _We_ don’t know what they’re doing to them. If you get taken again, and they’re pissed at you? You’re not coming back. Get it? And we _can’t_ …” he struggled for a moment, trying to find the words he needed. But that adrenaline surge was beginning to wane, making room for _very_ real fear.

Monty was gone.

Harper was gone.

They couldn’t afford to lose anyone else, and Bellamy was their only real shot at getting out of the Mountain alive. Jasper wasn’t an idiot – he was barely clinging to control by a thread. If Bellamy was taken, if Bellamy was _killed_ , then there was no hope left. That was it. Clarke had already abandoned them, and no one would be able to sneak in the way Bellamy had.

 _Fuck_ , they didn’t even know the full extent of what the capabilities of Mount Weather were. It might not just be their lives at stake anymore, it could be _everyone’s_ and Jasper couldn’t handle something like that. They _needed_ Bellamy’s guard training. _He_ needed Bellamy to be able to take charge because even if Bellamy didn’t know how to save them, at least he fucking _tried_.

“You’re not going anywhere,” a girl said from the crowd. “Not without us. And not without a fight.”

Bellamy opened his mouth to protest, because Jasper knew that’s what he was going to do, but Miller held up a hand.

“Don’t ask us to do less for you then you’re doing for us,” Miller said quietly.

Bellamy’s face tinged pink for a moment, and he ducked his head. “Fine.”

Jasper knew he was lying, but it didn’t matter. Because he at least spared them the truth of the matter, and let them believe that they could stand a chance. Bellamy wasn’t the type of leader who asked his people to go and die for him.

There wasn’t a chance in hell Bellamy was going to let them get between him and the Mount Weather guard.

The klaxons finally abated, and their absence left a ringing in his ears almost loud enough to drown out the sound of the doors opening.

Like frightened sheep, the remaining 47 bunched together, backing away from the doors as armed guards flooded in, automatic weapons half raised towards them.

 _Please let it be Wallace_ , Jasper thought desperately, even though he knew that didn’t make sense. If it was still Wallace in charge, he wouldn’t be sending armed guards to check on them. Not after telling them to leave.

His heart sank when Wallace’s son, Cage stepped around the wall of armed guards, Tsing following almost on his heels.

Jasper reached back without taking his eyes off of Cage, making sure Bellamy was firmly behind him, trying to be subtle. Maybe Cage wouldn’t look too closely. Maybe they were just here to make sure _they_ were still here.

There was a tense moment of silence, nobody speaking. You could’ve heard a pin drop.

And then suddenly Cage chuckled. “You kids,” he said, shaking his head as if this were a sitcom and he was trying to reprimand wayward children. “There’s been a change in plans. I know my father said that you were free to go, but…” he sighed regrettably. “I’m afraid I can’t let you leave just yet.”

Cage gestured for the guards to lower their weapons, and the guns dropped fractionally lower.

“You see…we _want_ to be able to go to the Ground. Just like you. But we need your help to do it,” Cage said, sounding sincere. “I know, I know…you’ve all been more than helpful with your donations, but I’m afraid it’s just not enough.”

Jasper could swear he felt his heart in his throat.

“Fortunately Doctor Tsing here,” Cage said, clapping a hand on Tsing’s shoulder, even as she glared at him. “She’s found a way for us to get your bodies’ ability to filter radiation – not just use it to patch us up after we’ve been exposed.”

And suddenly Jasper’s heart wasn’t in his throat. It plummeted almost to his toes. If they’d found another way, it means that had to have someone to try it on. It means they had to have someone to _take_ from.

So that’s what happened to Monty and Harper.

“Instead of using your blood itself, Tsing has found that the _source_ of your blood has the possibility of making us like you – immune to radiation.” Cage smiled, what he probably thought was disarmingly but instead reminded Jasper of an old story about a walrus and some clams.

Slightly worse than the look Cage gave them was the one Tsing had. Instead of predatory, her’s was cold, cool, and completely detached. She couldn’t be less concerned if she was looking at cell samples in a petri dish, and as far as she was concerned, that’s all they were.

Rats in a cage.

“I do have bad news though,” Cage continued. “It’s slightly more invasive than donating blood. But we’re not monsters here – we don’t want hurt you. If you volunteer, then we will make is as painless as possible. We don’t need to keep you – we’ll still let you go home. Return to your families. We just want to be able to go outside. You can understand that, can’t you?”

Jasper felt his skin crawl. He actually sounded sincere. He sounded like he wanted to help, and all he asked was for something in return – to help his people. That couldn’t be all bad, could it? Isn’t that what Bellamy and Clarke tried to do? What Chancellor Jaha tried to do by sending them to the ground in the first place? Doing what was best for their people?

This is what the Devil must be like when he comes to bargain for your soul.

“What exactly do you want from us?” Miller asked, distrust plainly evident in his voice.

Cage made an apologetic grimace. “Bone marrow.”

Jasper’s mind flashed back to a very brief, very basic biology class onboard the Ark from Abby Griffin. Bone marrow was the soft, fatty substance in bones that produced blood cells.

Key word was _in_ the bones.

“Did Harper volunteer?” a girl snapped – Fox.

“Is that where Monty is?” Jasper demanded, finally finding his voice. “Did they _volunteer_ or were they _voluntold_?”

Cage’s smile evaporated, his mouth thinning into a firm, bloodless line. Something dangerous flashed in those eyes, and Jasper wondered if he’d actually made it worse. If that was even possible. 

 “I said I don’t _want_ to hurt you. I didn’t say I _wouldn’t_. Offer still stands for the next ten seconds. Come quietly, and we’ll be able to have this done in no time. You’ll be able to go home – bone marrow reproduces, same as blood will replenish. Nothing is permanent. Refuse…” Cage let the threat hang.

There was dead silence.

Jasper could understand why. Tsing had been less than gentle with the blood donations. She cared little for the well-being of the 100 outside of what she could harvest from them. He shuddered at what she would do for the marrow. And at the same time…what were their choices? They were almost literally fish in a barrel.

But maybe…maybe if _one_ volunteered, the others would have a chance to get out?

“Fine,” he said, standing straight as he jutted his chin out defiantly. “I’ll go. But you have to promise not to hurt the others. And you have to let Harper and Monty come back.”

Cage stared at him a minute, before that predatory smile came back. “Sure thing kid.”

Jasper breathed a sigh of relief. This could still work. It _would_ still work. This was they could even get Harper and Monty back without having to go search for them. The 47 – well, 48 with Bellamy – would be together again.

 _Pain is temporary_ , he reminded himself. _I can do this_.

As soon as he stepped forwards however, Tsing shook her head. “Not that one. _That_ one,” she said, pointing to Fox.

Cage shrugged. “Sorry kid. Guess not.” He jerked his chin toward Fox. “You heard the Doc. Take her.”

“No!” Fox screamed, and was almost drowned out by the chorus of protests from the others.

The guards’ guns came up as half of them surged forwards, grabbing onto Fox’s arms and pulling her forwards, even as the other Delinquents tried to fight them off.

It was chaos. The kids had _had_ it with being lab rats. No amount of promises mattered anymore, because in less than five seconds, Cage had already gone against them. They were fighting for their lives.

It was the drop ship battle all over again, except there was no way to win this one. 

One guard grabbed Jasper’s arm as he swung at a different man, wrenching it around so that he was almost dislocating his shoulder. Before it popped, however, Bellamy collided with the soldier in a full on tackle, breaking his grip on Jasper and taking them both to the floor.

There was a mad scrabble as the guard suddenly realized he was fighting someone _much_ larger than the other kids, and more importantly, someone who knew how to fight _back._

And one who knew to go for his gun.

Bellamy dove for the dropped weapon, fingers latching around it seconds too late as a foot slammed down on his hand, pinning it to the floor with near breaking force and causing Bellamy to shout out in pain.

“ _Enough_!” Cage shouted angrily, loud enough to be heard over the fighting.

And _everyone_ froze. Even Jasper. Even the guards.

It wasn’t _what_ he’d shouted. It was _how_. That calm, affable mask that hid a predator dropped momentarily, and pure, unadulterated _rage_ flared. His face twisted into an almost inhuman snarl, and Jasper felt himself flinch back.

For a moment, Cage still looked like he was going to crush Bellamy’s hand under his heel, twisting his foot down on the small bones. Jasper thought he heard a crack, but Bellamy didn’t make another sound, gritting his teeth.

And just as suddenly as the rage came, it was gone, and Cage frowned down at Bellamy.

“I don’t know you,” Cage said, sounding curious. “Where did you come from?”

Bellamy remained silent, glaring balefully up at Cage.

“He’s the Grounder one of your pet monsters brought in,” Tsing said. “The one that went missing from the Harvest room.” She pointed out the bright patch of white gauze on Bellamy’s neck, previously hidden by his shirt collar. “See?”

Cage smirked. “I think it’s pretty obvious this one isn’t a Grounder, wouldn’t you say?” He pressed down on Bellamy’s hand, and this time Jasper _definitely_ heard a crack.

“Huh,” Cage said, impressed. “You hardly blinked. I think you’d make a much better prospect for Cerberus than Harvest.”

“No,” Tsing interrupted, and there was a positively _gleeful_ tone to her voice. “He’s the one that set the record timing.”

 “Ahhh,” Cage said, as if something suddenly made much more sense. “So _you’re_ the one she won’t shut up about. I admit, I was wondering why a run of the mill Grounder savage would be so different, but that’s because you’re _not_ , are you?” His shark like gaze flickered to the crowd, now pressed behind a wall of guards. “You’re one of _them_.”

Without warning, Cage pulled back one foot and kicked Bellamy in the side as hard as he could, but he wasn’t looking at Bellamy – he was looking at the other kids.

As Bellamy coughed and gagged, and the rest of the Delinquents shouted protests, surging forwards again but to no avail.

“And apparently, you seem to _matter_ to them,” Cage said carefully. “Now _that_ is interesting. Take him, too.”

“No, wait!” Jasper protested, futilely pushing against the guard blocking him. “Not him!”

“Shut up, Jasper,” Bellamy growled. Two guards grabbed him by the arms, hauling him upright even as they pinned his hands behind his back. “Stay with them. I can handle it.”

Cage watched the two of them with interest. “I see…” he said suddenly, as if he had a revelation of biblical proportions. “You’re not just _one_ of them…you’re their _leader_. I suppose that explains the age difference…I was beginning to wonder why none of you Sky People seemed to have anyone over the age of eighteen, but clearly you do.” He paused, running a critical eye over Bellamy. “From one leader to another, I’ll make you a deal.”

“Bellamy, _no_!” Jasper protested, earning a rifle butt to the gut.

“Bellamy, huh?” Cage repeated, stepping so close to Bellamy they almost touched. “All right then, _Bellamy_. You come quietly, and I won’t take one of them, too. At least for now. And I’ll make sure that nothing happens to them in the meantime.”

Bellamy’s face darkened, and for a moment, Jasper thought he might actually take the deal because Bellamy was a moron when it came to his own self-preservation. Instead, Bellamy reared his head back, and slammed the crown of his forehead into Cage’s nose.

There was an audible crack as cartilage snapped, blood pouring everywhere as Cage fell to the ground, stunned.

The guards twisted his arms behind him, and with a pop, soundly dislocated Bellamy’s shoulder, dropping him to his knees with a cry of pain.

“I’ll take that as a no,” Cage grunted, pushing to his feet. He swayed slightly, and another guard caught his elbow, steadying him. “I’ll give you this, kid. You got courage.” He sniffed, wiping at the blood on his face. “Or maybe you’re just suicidal. But congratulations – you’re the only one coming with us.”

He jerked his head towards the door, and the guards started to drag Bellamy out, unmindful of the fact that they were twisting the damaged shoulder even further out of its socket.

“No!” Fox screamed, and like a dam had been broken, the 47 pushed back against the guards, redoubling their efforts to get to Bellamy.

Bellamy, not about to be dragged away willingly, twisted in the guards’ grip, bringing his knee up simultaneously between one’s knees with enough force to drop the man to the ground with a high pitched screech.

Jasper couldn’t blame him.

But it was a losing battle. There were more of the 47, but it was a terrible way to fight, almost causing more issues than helping with the sheer number because they were in a small space. They could hardly fight back without accidentally hitting each other, and the guards knew it. They allowed themselves to be pushed back towards the door, until they managed to get into the hallway, and Tsing slid the doors shut, almost catching one or two of the Delinquents in it.

It didn’t stop them from pounding on the door, shouting death threats that were colorful enough that Jasper was reminded that they were all criminals.

Bellamy continued to fight, though ‘protest’ was probably a better term. He was down one arm, and the other guard still had a hold of him, but that didn’t stop Bellamy from bracing his feet against the floor as they tried to drag him, or even flat out biting one of them who put their hands too close to his face.

Finally, Cage rolled his eyes, reached a hand into his pocket and pulled out his injector gun. He fished into Tsing’s pocket, pulling out a small vial filled with clear liquid. He fastened it into place, and in a motion faster than Jasper would’ve thought possible, grabbed Bellamy’s dislocated arm and wrenched it back into place, causing Bellamy to again cry out and almost fall, but he caught himself last moment. Just as fast, Cage pressed the injector to the side of Bellamy’s neck, and emptied half the container in one go.

Bellamy dropped like a rock, collapsing to the ground in a boneless heap.  

“Bellamy!” Jasper shouted, pounding on the door as he watched through the windows. He wasn’t the only one. All around him, the others were still shouting, as if the sheer volume would get Bellamy up again.

Because he _had_ to be okay. He just _had_ to be.

Cage held the injector up for all of them to see, raising his finger to his lips in a shushing motion.

Probably out of curiosity more than anything else, the shouting and pounding started to taper off to a dull roar, and Cage only had to raise his voice enough to be heard through the glass.

“He just got enough to down a Reaper. Another word out of _any_ of you, and he gets the rest, _understand_?” Cage said condescendingly. “And just in case you don’t what that means, I’ll spell it out for you – one _peep_ and your fearless leader gets a fatal overdose.”

Before they could protest, Cage jerked his head at the remaining guards that Bellamy _hadn’t_ managed to take out, and they grabbed him under his arms again to lift him.

Jasper couldn’t help the grimace at how much that arm was going to hurt when Bellamy woke up.

If Bellamy woke up.

“Now what?” someone said, barely above a whisper.

“We’re never getting out of here,” another said, and there was a general consensus that rippled through the group.

Jasper felt his hands clench in rage, and before anyone else could say another disparaging word, he turned to the crowd. “Shut up!” he shouted. “All of you!”

There was a stunned silence that greeted him.

“Don’t you _dare_ give up now!” he continued, not entirely sure where the sudden ‘take charge’ attitude just came from. “Bellamy got in here without them noticing! He got free of the Harvest chamber once already! You think he’s not going to do it again?”

When no one contradicted him, he kept going, gathering steam. “We’re not done, so don’t you fucking give up, understand? They want us? They’ll have to fight every _single_ one of us. You think Bellamy didn’t know what he was doing? We’re still here, aren’t we? We still have another card – they don’t know about anyone else helping us. We’re _still_ going home, got it? We’re _all_ going home, so don’t give up now.”

There wasn’t a resounding cheer or round of applause, but he could see his words had some effect on them.  A few offered wan smiles, a couple looked mildly defiant.

They were going to get out of this.

 _They were going to get out of this_.

He just had no idea how, and as he watched the other forty-five go back to their respective bunks, or huddle together for support, he let go of a breath he didn’t know he was holding, feeling his shoulders sag as he allowed himself to drop against the closed doors, sliding to the floor.

“Way to channel your inner Bellamy,” Miller said, flashing a brief, grim smile. “Didn’t know you had it in you.” He clapped Jasper on the shoulder before he went back to his bunk.

Because it was easy to pretend to be Bellamy. But Jasper knew, deep down, as much as he wanted it to be true, he didn’t have that kind of leadership. He didn’t know how to balance the lives of everyone he was suddenly responsible for against overwhelming odds. 

He knew Bellamy didn’t necessarily _like_ being in charge, but he was also the one that everyone automatically looked to. He understood consequences. He understood sacrifice.

Because when it came down to it, Bellamy Blake wasn’t the type of leader who told his followers to go and die for him.

He was the one who went to die their place.


	6. Chapter 6

Bellamy dreamed.

At least he hoped they were dreams.

To be perfectly honest, he couldn’t tell the difference anymore. Nightmares bled into reality until he couldn’t tell if he was awake or unconscious.

Everything hurt. _Everything_. Down to his bones in a way he didn’t even think was possible. His throat burned, scratched raw and bleeding every time they inserted and removed the NG tube once Cage had decided that him being allowed to eat in his own was a freedom he couldn’t allow.

Because if left alone, Bellamy would’ve left himself to starve to death.

And they couldn’t have that, could they. Not when they’d figured out there was something different about him. Something _wrong_. Or maybe very right, depending on how one looked at it.

Bellamy dreamed.

He dreamed of being in space, looking down at the Earth, and wondering what it was like.

He dreamed of small, cramped cages, when all he wanted to see were stars.

He dreamed of hands…so many hands…some that hurt. Some that helped. Some that did neither. Some that did both.

And every time he tried to speak, he dreamed of fire. Of broken glass and the empty vacuum of space and the absence of sound.

Except no matter what he did, he could still hear screaming.

He tried to put his hands up over his ears, but someone caught them, forcing them back down to his sides.

He tried to twist away and someone held his shoulders down.

He was going to be floated, just like his mother.

He was going back to the lab.

He was being thrown in a cage.

And above it all he could hear screaming and crying that wasn’t his own and he could no longer scream to block it out.

He slammed his head back, desperate to find something, anything that was going to block it out. The hollow echo of bone on metal, the tapping of fingers on skin, the pulse that was far too fast to be soothing but at least it was better than the screaming.

Always the screaming.

So _much_ pain.

There was nothing. His head hit something soft, his hands scrabbled against soundless fabric. He could find nothing in the abyss he found himself floating in.

He kicked out with his feet, searching for the edge of his cage. The frame of the cot. Something. _Anything_.

He almost sobbed with relief when his foot connected with something with a crash. Something metal, and it made his foot sting and burn but at least there was a momentary relief of _noise_. He kicked out again, searching the empty space for the metal object but it was gone.

Perhaps he’d only imagined it.

Was he still dreaming?

He tried to pull his hands up, but something held them fast. He tried to slide them loose, but the restraints held with him.

There used to be enough room to pull, to catch skin against leather and if he couldn’t distract himself with sound, at least he could redirect with pain – and not the cold, distant calculated slices like brush strokes, but the nerves afire agony of raw and opened wounds that split the skin like fissures through the cracked and broken earth.

But now the restraints moved with him, never allowing for that snap and pull, that jerk at the end of the leash no matter how he pushed and pulled and yanked against them.

He was alone and adrift, nothing to anchor him down. He was floating.

Just like his mother.

Except he could still hear screaming.

Too many voices. _So many_.

For all that the hands followed him, he couldn’t bring his hands to his ears.

Everything hurt but not _enough_. Not enough to block it out. Not enough to make the screaming go away.

There were suddenly hands on his face, fingers in his hair, the pressed of lips against his ear. They weren’t so much gentle as they were frantic, tangling in his hair, thumbs wiping steady lines across his cheeks.

Had he been crying?

The hushed whispers against his ear drowned out the others.

 

“ _There passed a weary time. Each throat_

_Was parched, and glazed each eye._

_A weary time! a weary time!_

_How glazed each weary eye…”_

 

The words were desperate, quick and broken. More pleading then any ancient poem ever was.

Maybe he wasn’t the only one crying.

_“When looking westward, I beheld_

_A something in the sky.”_

 

He knew those words. He _knew_ that _voice_.

_“At first it seemed a little speck,_

_And then it seemed a mist;_

_It moved and moved, and took at last_

_A certain shape, I wist.”_

 

There was a shuddering breath, and in the momentary silence, he could hear others.

“I thought you said it was going to last!”

“I _thought_ it _would_!”

“Did you at least manage to fix it?”

“I don’t know…I think so? It’s too early to tell.”

He tried to twist his head away again, to find his way back to the dream of ships and albatrosses, of cursed men and memory of reciting the rhyme for hours to an infant in a bed kept beneath the floor.

 

_“A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!_

_And still it neared and neared:_

_As if it dodged a water-sprite,_

_It plunged and tacked and veered.”_

 

Less frantic, less desperation. He could feel her hands against his face, her forehead against his, the brush of her hair against his ears. He could picture her in every detail.

 _Please be a dream_ , he thought, squeezing his eyes shut even tighter. _Don’t be here_.

“Bellamy?” she whispered, sniffing quietly. “Bell? Open your eyes.”

He fought to turn his head away from her, but her gentle hands held fast.

“This is real, Bell,” she whispered. And just to emphasize her point, she lightly tapped her forehead against his. “ _I’m_ real.”

 _No_.

No, no, no, no, _no_ , **_no_**.

Octavia couldn’t be here. She couldn’t. They didn’t even know about her. Did they? Did they find out? Had he said something?

Was she here because of him?

No. No, it couldn’t be her, it _wasn’t_ her and it was just another nightmare. He needed to wake up, he _had_ to wake up, he _had_ to be dreaming.

He wrenched himself sideways, so completely unexpectedly that the restraining arms didn’t even hold him and he fought against them with everything he had.

His sister would not be the weapon that broke him.

He needed _sound._ He needed _hurt_. He couldn’t float in this terrible abyss that drowned out everything in silence so loud it drowned out everything.

Everything except that awful _screaming_. 

“Hold him!” someone shouted. “He can’t be moving around yet!”

“I’m _trying_!” another voice snapped back.

“ _You’re home_!” Octavia shouted, and it took longer than it should have for him to realize she meant the Ark.

It took him longer to realize that she was crying.

Longer still to realize he could move, and he wasn’t.

“You’re home,” she repeated, her voice softening, and he could feel her hands on his face again. Cautious. Gentle. He could feel her fingers trace the scar on his temple, shaking slightly. “You’re _home_ , you’re _home_ , _you’re_ home.”

He cautiously opened one eye, blinking rapidly against the blinding light and for a moment he was back in the Mountain, strapped down on the table like a rat ready for dissection and he felt his heartrate skyrocket.

“No, _no_ , don’t do that,” Octavia pleaded suddenly, and the gentle fingers against his cheek tightened, her short fingernails digging lightly into his skin. “Stay here. Stay with me, I’m _here_.”

He fumbled with his free arm, trying to move it with a sense of purpose but it felt like the entire limb had gone to sleep, leaving his fingers numb and the movements heavy and disjointed.

Octavia caught it easily, holding it against her face.

He could feel the dampness to her cheeks. Could see the pain in her eyes, heard the desperation in her voice.

He risked a glance around, almost afraid to look away from her in case she _was_ a figment of his imagination, or a fevered dream sent to torment him.

He half expected to see lab. He half expected to see the medical bay in Arkadia.

Instead, he was in a room. He was on a bedroll on the floor and he was dimly aware of the fact that there were more pillows and cushions piled around and under him then he would’ve thought possible.

“You okay now?”

Bellamy blinked, much slower, and finally he managed to turn his head enough to see Kane, kneeling on the ground beside his bed.

The former chancellor looked much older than he remembered.

Maybe because he looked much more worried than he could remember.

Bellamy let his gaze drift back to his sister, who hadn’t move and he realized she was almost straddling him, but without putting any weight on him and keeping him almost entirely on his side.

“I’m sorry, Bellamy,” a new voice said, sounding rough with emotion, and Bellamy had to crane his neck around his sister to see Abby – also kneeling – by his feet, one hand resting on his right foot. “You weren’t supposed to wake up, not for a little while longer. We wanted to make sure you were settled while you were still asleep. I thought it might be easier.”

“She fixed your back, Bell,” Octavia said, offering a brittle smile. “At least we think so. We’ll try it later though, okay? But you need to go back to sleep. Okay? I’ll be right here. I won’t go anywhere. But you can’t be moving around.”

The words meant little to Bellamy, and he felt like he was trying to translate everything as they said it. He could feel darkness pulling at him, but he fought to keep his eyes open.

 _I’m sorry_ , he mouthed, clenching his fist and drawing it in a circle across his chest.

“Sorry?” Octavia echoed, frowning slightly. “Don’t be sorry. You don’t have to apologize for anything. Just go back to sleep. I won’t let anything bad happen to you. I promise.”

And he did.  


	7. Chapter 7

Kane rubbed a tired hand over his face, trying to scrub at least some semblance of alertness in. He should sleep. He’d been up for hours now.

Not hours. Days. Day and a half. Maybe. He’d completely lost track.

He shook his head, and stifled a yawn with another hand. However the Hell long it had been, it was too long, but every time he started to doze, something would wake him.

That something being Bellamy.

As soon as he’d passed out, Abby had made an executive decision – operate as quickly as she could to relieve the pressure from the spinal hematoma. Exhaustion, fever and the amount of tranquilizers still running through his veins turned out to be a suitable combination – he hadn’t moved the entire time.

When Abby was done, however, they ran into a new set of problems, first one being that the medical bay was not set up for long term care. Secondly being that Bellamy couldn’t move around once the anesthesia wore off – there was too much of a risk that he could cause further damage or bleeding, and they could guess how well he would react to coming out of any type of sedation surrounded by medical supplies in a place he might not immediately recognize.

The first one was solved easily enough. Abby said she could fix up a normal living quarter as a recovery room, and that was when they both realized neither Bellamy or Octavia _had_ a room. Octavia opted for camping, and no one could blame her after spending almost her whole life hiding under a floor, and Bellamy had never been in camp long enough to actually receive a room of his own. With Farm Station survivors now living in Arkadia as well, space was tight.

Kane was the one to suggest they use his room, and he was almost positive Octavia would refuse. He wouldn’t have blamed her. The fiercely independent young woman didn’t like to be under the eyes of any of the adults, and he knew she still harbored at least some resentment to both him and Jaha for her imprisonment, and the death of her mother.

Instead, Octavia looked so grateful he thought she might cry, which was worse than being refused because he had no idea what he was supposed to do with a crying _anything_ , never mind a teenaged girl. She’d given Kane the briefest of hugs that felt more like a small threat of being able to break his ribs if she decided she wanted to, before she disappeared.

It wasn’t until after Abby and Kane had managed to carefully wrestle a still unconscious Bellamy onto a stretcher and carried him the short distance to Kane’s quarters that they saw her again. In the short time she’d been gone, she’d found every spare blanket, pillow, cloak and fur that she could, piling them on the floor in almost a fort, and Kane had to smile.

No one could say that the Blake children were unintelligent. The soft cushioning was perfect for Bellamy – almost every square inch of him was bruised or injured and he hadn’t done himself any favors fighting with them every step of the way. More importantly, given how fast he seemed to go from lucid to delusional, there wasn’t anything hard for him to hit against, and unlike the table in the medical bay, it was already on the ground. If he did manage to roll off of it, it would be a gentle decline to the floor.

Kane wondered idly if the reason she was good with pillow forts was due to growing up a secret child, unable to leave her cabin for sixteen years – he doubted there was much to do in a fifteen by ten cabin. It was a miracle she wasn’t either claustrophobic or agoraphobic.

They’d managed the short trip from the medical bay to the cabin with no issues, but as soon as they’d moved him from the stretcher to the homemade bed, Bellamy started to wake.

Wake wasn’t even an appropriate term for it, because he wasn’t actually conscious. Every movement was disjointed, like he was trying to fight something even in his dreams.

In his dreams, Bellamy could still speak, because he definitely tried – they learned he _could_ make noise. But Kane wished he wouldn’t. His voice was gone – more than worn out, it didn’t even register as words. It came out breathy and gasping, the noise mostly from the simple act of air passing through his lips than his vocal chords.

Probably a good thing, because in Bellamy’s dreams, he didn’t speak – he _screamed_.

He came awake resisting, and for some reason kept trying to pull his hands up to his head, but Octavia stopped him, catching his flailing hands in hers as she tried to soothe him. They remembered all too clearly when he was first brought in, and he tried to dig his nails through his scalp, gouging into his skin and pulling at his hair.

Except as soon as they blocked one action, he tried another – violently throwing his head back and away from his sister, trying to turn and twist away to the point Octavia had to straddle him, kneeling over him and trapping his movements with her legs as she held onto his hands. They missed him when he lashed out with his foot and kicked over the stool nearby, sending it clattering to the ground.

The strangest part though, was that as soon as he heard the crash of metal, he seemed _relieved_ and immediately tried to kick in the same area.

“Sensory input,” Abby said abruptly. “He’s trying to find something tangible – _that’s_ what Jasper meant. Sick as he is, he’s trying to figure out what’s real.”

For a moment, when Octavia started to recite _Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner_ in quiet, desperate whispers, face pressed so close to her brother’s that Kane could barely see him, he thought maybe she’d managed to get through to him. For several beats, Bellamy relaxed fractionally – his constant motion slowing as he seemed to process Octavia’s voice.

But nothing could be that simple. He had no idea what happened, but suddenly Bellamy was fighting with everything he had, twisting under Octavia as he tried to push away from her, uncoordinated limbs trying to latch on to _something_.

“Hold him!” Abby commanded, grabbing onto Bellamy’s leg as he narrowly missed kicking her in the face. “He can’t be moving around yet!”

“I’m _trying_!” Kane was reluctant to try and hold Bellamy down considering the reactions seemed to be worse when he was restrained, but he at least managed to catch a wildly swinging arm before it smacked him or Octavia in the face.

 “You’re _home_!” Octavia said suddenly, desperation making her voice crack.

Bellamy froze, tilting his head slightly at the words, and Octavia latched onto them like they were a life raft, repeating them over and over again until finally, _finally_ Bellamy opened his eyes.

There was little recognition there, and for a brief moment it seemed like his nightmare was going to follow him into the waking world, but Octavia stopped it in its tracks.

“No, no, _no_ ,” she scolded gently, and Kane could see her press her nails into his skin to get him to understand _she_ was real. There were no more monsters to fight.

Bellamy tried to move, raising his hand towards her face but lacking in anything resembling coordination.

Kane tried to ignore the suspicious gleam in his eyes, or the dampness on his cheeks that seemed to constantly plague Bellamy as his sister caught his hand, pressing it to her own face as she tried to explain to him what happened. How he should be able to walk again.

He doubted much of it registered. Bellamy’s gaze roved constantly, anywhere except for directly up at the overhead lights.

He mouthed something to Octavia, circling his fist in a disjointed across his chest as he did so.

 “Sorry?” Octavia said, frowning slightly. “Don’t be sorry. You don’t have to apologize for anything. Just go back to sleep. I won’t let anything bad happen to you. I promise.”

All of that was several hours ago.

Kane should be sleeping.

He _wanted_ to sleep.

But somehow, every time he closed his eyes, as soon as he started to drift, there was a sudden, blinding panic that maybe the last day and a half were imagined.

Maybe, as non-idyllic as it was, was all a dream. None of the kids came home.

Or worse, maybe it was all real…and it just wasn’t over.

Were the Mountain Men coming for the rest of them? How did the kids escape? _Did_ they escape? Or were they let go?

Kane desperately wanted to ask, but he couldn’t find it in himself to interrupt any of the reunited families with an interrogation. Monty’s family had come and gathered Jasper back to their unit. According to Abby, the poor kid had basically decided that if Bellamy was finally out, then it was safe for him to be too. He was less unconscious than in an exhausted, near impossible to disturb sleep. 

Bellamy suddenly shifted on his makeshift bed, curling in on himself as another nightmare struck. His hands scrabbled weakly against the blankets, his entire body arcing as he simultaneously tried to wake himself and keep himself as still as possible. It was a strange conflict to watch – caught between a memory, a nightmare and the waking world that wasn’t necessarily better than either.

Without opening her eyes, Octavia, half asleep herself, gently shushed him, quietly reciting more from the _Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner_ as she pulled him closer to her.

Kane doubted it was her original intention for a sleeping arrangement, but he could be wrong. They’d discovered that the fastest, easiest way to calm Bellamy back to sleep while keeping him in the position needed to allow his back a chance to heal was to have Octavia behind him, arms wrapped around him and her face pressed almost into the base of his neck to keep him from rolling away. One leg was wrapped around his to keep him from kicking out, and it added another source of contact.

Bellamy’s inability to sleep was another, separate cause for concern. Usually, if someone was injured, and especially to the degree he was, they could do little more than sleep. If falling asleep was a problem, a sedative was easily administered. But not now.

The last thing they wanted to do was keep his tolerance up, which meant as few drugs as possible. But that meant that he was constantly in pain, which kept him from resting, which kept him from healing. People weren’t designed to go without sleep. They _needed_ dreamless sleep, and Bellamy was averaging only twenty to forty-five minutes at a time before he would jerk awake.

And just because the world wasn’t cruel enough, it wasn’t even that he couldn’t sleep that was creating problems. It was how fast he went from dozing to adrenaline fueled ‘fight or flight’ mode. Bellamy didn’t just blink awake and roll over and go back to sleep – he moved before he even opened his eyes, violently trying to fling himself away from _anything_ he could be touching.

The almost full body restraint hold Octavia had him in was the kindest thing they could think of to keep him from injuring himself further.

 _Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner_ was not what he was expecting Octavia’s soothing words to be, though he supposed he shouldn’t be all that surprised. Aurora Blake was a historian by trade, along with being a seamstress. She used to recite the old mythology stories by rote to the younger kids. It made sense she would do the same for her own children, and those were the words they would find comfort in.

There was a soft knock at the door, and Kane almost threw himself at it to keep whoever it was from knocking again, risking a quick glance at the siblings before he opened it. Both of them remained in an uneasy sleep.

“Can we talk?”

Pike stood on the threshold of his door, looking thoroughly nonplussed at the predicament.

Risking one more glance back at the Blake’s, Kane stepped outside, wincing even at the slight noise the door made as it closed.

“So what’s the story?” Pike asked, not mincing words.

Kane shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. He can’t talk – or he won’t, but Abby thinks he actually _can’t_ at the moment. When she took a look at him, his throat was pretty damaged. She thinks it was from a NG tube that was repeatedly inserted and taken out, but she’s just guessing.”

“Did the others have any explanation?” Pike pressed, crossing his arms.

Kane felt the last few tenuous threads of his temper start to fray as he ran a hand through his hair. “No, because I’m not that cruel,” he snapped. “They’re with their families for the first time in _months_. And you think I want to go and interrogate them?”

Pike seemed unfazed. “I understand that, Kane. You know I do. But at the same time, I have to look out for everyone – not just a few. You remember what that was like, right?”

Kane clenched his jaw so tightly he was surprised it didn’t snap. “I know you take your responsibilities as chancellor very seriously. But you also have to remember, these are _kids_. Kids who have been to hell and back and then back to hell again. They haven’t seen their families since we sent them down here on the off chance they wouldn’t immediately die. Give them _time_ ,” Kane said. “Give them time with their families, time to decompress…to be _kids_ again.”

Pike frowned. “You didn’t seem all that concerned about that particular fact when you made the suggestion to send them to Earth in the first place.” He frowned, his brow furrowing. “What are the Blakes to you?”

 _Not this again_ , Kane thought irritably. Anyone who took a look at him and knew how fair skinned Aurora had been would know that he wasn’t Bellamy’s father. No one knew who that was except Aurora – and she’d taken the secret to her grave. It didn’t stop the rumors though.

And Bellamy had unwittingly fueled them when it turned out that Kane was one of the few adults that the young man would listen to, begrudgingly or otherwise.

“I’m not talking about just Bellamy, I’m talking about _all_ of them. Jasper, Monty, Harper, Miller – all forty-seven of them. We don’t know what they’ve been through.”

Pike tilted his head to the side, the way he did when something caught his attention as being particularly interesting or incriminating. “Actually, I would say quite the opposite. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with any of them _except_ Blake. Not a scratch, not a bruise…nothing. And then there’s Blake.”

Maybe it was the lack of sleep, but Kane had no idea what the hell the Chancellor was trying to get at. He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to ward off the headache he could feel coming on. “What are you implying?”

Pike shrugged. “Nothing.”

Kane crossed his arms over his chest, glaring at the newly elected chancellor. Pike had won over Arkadia in a landslide vote once Farm Station had combined with former Camp Jaha, and so far Kane didn’t have any outright complaints against the man. For the most part, he was a decent man, a good choice by the people. Being the only adult with any real Earth Skills, he seemed like a good pick.

But there was something…off about him. Farm Station survivors had found the camp, what few lived through the crash and guerilla warfare from the local Grounder tribes, and from what little they’d been told, it had been a bloody affair. Now Pike was adamant about the safety of Arkadia, and while Kane couldn’t fault the desire to want to protect everyone from everything, he wasn’t entirely sure Pike was going about it the right way.

There came a point between liberty and safety, one of them was going to be compromised for the other, and Pike seemed to favor safety. Already the comings and goings from the camp was restricted. Patrols increased. They almost cut themselves off entirely from the Grounders after Mount Weather released their people – not that it wasn’t mutually agreed upon.

“I know you too well, Charles. It’s been a very, _very_ long couple of days. Get to your point,” Kane growled.

Pike shrugged again, but there was a hard edge to his eyes. “What do we know about what really happened? Were they released? Did they escape? Why is Blake the only one who shows any signs of being a prisoner?” He stepped forward, but Kane didn’t move. “I’ve heard from a couple of the kids about how there was a Grounder tactic to subdue enemy forces by contaminating them with a fever. One that killed a couple of them.”

“If that was the case, why would you be standing right next to me?” Kane demanded. “I’ve been more exposed than anyone in the camp, except for Octavia and Abby. And why would Mount Weather want to kill us?”

“I’m not saying that they do. I’m saying that I find it incredibly suspicious that out of forty-seven donors, the only one they went after was Bellamy. That’s what Clarke said, right? That the people of Mount Weather needed bone marrow to be able to walk outside. Something about our immunity to radiation.”

Kane gritted his teeth. “If you want to know what happened with Clarke’s negotiation with Mount Weather, I suggest you talk to _her_ , not me or Bellamy. And if she actually tells you anything, let me know, because I haven’t seen her since the kids got back and I’m beginning to wonder exactly what the hell kind of deal she made with them.”

Pike didn’t answer immediately, and after a moment asked, “Is he going to be okay?”

Kane shrugged this time. “Maybe? Bellamy is a strong kid, but…did they a lot of damage. I don’t know what was meant to be torture and what wasn’t, but he’s suffered. More than anyone should.”

Pike nodded, like he was agreeing. “So you would say he’s got some psychological issues going on too?”

Kane answered, without really thinking about it. “Of course he does. I mean, near as Abby can tell, and from what Jasper alluded to, he was used for medical experiments for the people in Mount Weather. He was a prisoner for weeks, and who knows what happened before that? We didn’t exactly talk to him before he volunteered to go into the bunker. And who knows about the others? Jasper and Monty and Miller…they’re probably _all_ going to have some form of PTSD to work through.”

“Would you say he’s dangerous?” Pike asked.

Kane frowned. “What?”

Pike indicated the closed door, obviously meaning Bellamy. “Would you say he’s dangerous?”

“Of course not,” Kane snapped. “Where the hell would you even get that idea?”

Pike sighed, like he was about to lecture a particularly difficult student on what he thought was a remedial subject. “Maybe because Bellamy was a trained guardsman? That he’s the only kid with firearm training? That he tried to _murder_ Jaha when he was chancellor? That he has a history of violence _before_ he was a prisoner?”

Kane felt his heart clench. “Bellamy also helped _protect_ the kids on the ground. He risked his life to go into that mountain.”

“And as soon as he could, he stole your gun and fired at two of my soldiers,” Pike pointed out. “Whether he was in his right mind or not, he’s a danger. Hell, the fact that he could still steal your weapon and get off two rounds before you stopped him _while_ he was tranquilized gives _more_ concern, not less.”

 “He’s _not_ dangerous,” Kane said firmly. “None of them are. We can’t hold him responsible for his actions right now, that’s not right and you know it.”

Pike held up his hands, palms out in a placating manner. “Look, I’m not saying that. I’m saying that _in spite_ of that, he’s a security problem. What happens if he has another episode like that? What if next time he doesn’t miss?”

“He can’t even walk on his own,” Kane snarled. “And you’re worried he’s going to try and take out your security?”

“I’m saying maybe he needs to be in some place slightly more secure than your room until we can further assess his mental state,” Pike said. “I already discussed it with Jaha, and he agrees.”

 _Of course he agrees_ , Kane thought snidely. Bellamy had already shot him once, and since the former chancellor returned from his failed biblical sojourn into the wasteland in search of a mythological city, he’d been more of an ass than Kane could remember him ever being.

“Did you speak to Abby?” Kane asked.

Pike glanced away briefly. “Yes.”

“I’m willing to bet she told you the same thing I’m about to tell you,” Kane said mildly.

“And what would that be?”

Kane stepped closer, his boots now toe to toe with Pike, forcing the shorter man to look up at him. “You’ll take him over _my dead body_ ,” he growled. “He didn’t go through hell just to get thrown into another one. And if Jaha wants to be an ass about it, tell him he already pardoned Bellamy. Bellamy is staying right where he is until he’s recovered enough to decide for himself where he wants to go. _Understand?_ ”

Pike gave him a strange sort of half smile, like that was exactly the response he was expecting from him. “Sure. Sure thing, Marcus. I’ll let you get back to him then, shall I?”

Kane frowned. He wasn’t entirely sure he liked how quickly Pike gave up, but he was too tired to pursue it now. “Good night, Chancellor,” he said through clenched teeth.

Pike gave him a quick nod of the chin before walking off back down the corridor, not saying another word.

Kane watched him go, and it wasn’t until he turned the corner that he let out the breath he didn’t even know he’d been holding.

Pike was too ambitious for his own good. And worse, he seemed uniquely gifted to firing people up and convincing them that he had their best interests at heart. And while fanatical about some things, he genuinely seemed to care about the safety and well-being of the Arkadians.

It was just something else to worry about, he reminded himself as he let himself back into the room, gently easing the door shut behind him.

The room was mostly dark, but he could see that the Blakes hadn’t moved from the makeshift bed. Octavia’s arm was still wrapped protectively around her older brother’s, clasping onto his hands to keep him from gouging at himself anymore, but she breathed slowly and evenly, which meant she was still asleep.

With a sigh, he let himself drop onto the floor just in front of them, running a tired hand through his hair. He grabbed a pillow off his own bed, tossing it onto the floor as he lay down on it.

He would worry about Pike later, he thought tiredly, sparing one last glance at the siblings.

And cursed.

Bellamy was wide awake, dark eyes staring at him in the dimness.

He’d heard every goddamned word.


	8. Chapter 8

“Look, kid, I’m sorry about that…” Kane started, fumbling for the right words. He wondered if it even mattered, if Bellamy had even understood all that he’d heard, when he realized what he was looking at.

Bellamy wasn’t fighting with Octavia. He wasn’t thrashing or caught in some fever ridden nightmare riding out the last of the sedatives Jasper had shot him with. There was an awareness in those dark eyes he hadn’t seen in ages.

Despite everything, Kane couldn’t help but smile. “Hey, that’s better,” he said quietly. He wondered if he should sit up, caught between the formality of knowing he wasn’t anything more than their former council member, and the strangely paternal feeling that he wanted to give in to. But as soon as he shifted, Bellamy flinched – not hard, but enough that Kane stopped moving.

“Hey, it’s okay. I’ll just stay where I am then, alright?” Kane soothed, relaxing back into his pillow.

The floor wasn’t comfortable, and with the amount of blankets Bellamy was currently lying on, they weren’t exactly level to one another, but maybe that was okay. Height had its advantages, right? And at least he wasn’t looming over him.

Bellamy remained still, dark eyes wide even in the dimness of the cabin, but Kane could still hear his rapid breathing. He knew he was sick, but there was an odd sort of whistle to him every time he took a deep breath. One that didn’t sound like any cold or flu Kane had ever witnessed. He made a mental note to ask Abby about it later.

Kane wasn’t good with awkward silences, and he didn’t want to let this first chance to actually talk Bellamy go – even if he couldn’t talk back. Neither was he sure what exactly Bellamy remembered from the past few days.

“Your leg should start feeling better soon,” he said quietly. “Abby made an executive decision to operate while you were out. She said it was a hematoma from someone botching a spinal tap, but she thinks she fixed it. You might need a brace like Raven, but if she’d left it alone, it was only going to get worse.”

Bellamy blinked slowly, offering no other acknowledgement of anything Kane said, but it was clear he was processing it.

Actually, Kane realized, he was watching Bellamy do a near silent assessment of himself, working the tips of his fingers, flexing his arms, and gently rolling his shoulders – all without disturbing Octavia. As he worked his way down to his feet, as Kane watched him flex his toes and bend his knee, it occurred to him just _why_ he was doing it.

He was testing Kane’s statement. He didn’t believe him. 

No, no…that wasn’t quite right either.

He was making sure nothing else had been done while he was unconscious.

The thought struck him so suddenly he thought he was going to be physically ill, enough that he put his hand over his mouth. How had that not even occurred to him? After what he’d witnessed, from what Jasper implied, _shit_ even from what they knew from the radio transmissions they’d intercepted from Mount Weather. As far as Bellamy was concerned, he’d gone from being in a hospital room to somewhere else, with no clear memory of how he got there. Of course he would default back to the reaction he would have as a prisoner in the mountain.

Bellamy’s gaze followed him, brow furrowing slightly in confusion.

“I’m sorry,” Kane said, barely above a whisper.

Instead of understanding, Bellamy’s frown deepened.

“I shouldn’t have let you go to Mount Weather. Not like that. Not by yourself, not without any sort of plan to get you out if things went wrong,” Kane clarified.

It was a guilt that gnawed at him, hollowing him out as the weeks dragged on and no word about the missing kids. They’d let themselves fall into the trap that they had to let the kids do what they believed in, to fight on the front lines – to treat them as battle hardened soldiers, when they were no more than kids with a hell of a will to live. Clarke and Bellamy offered a united front, a reasoning that was hard to argue with. They had more time on the ground. They’d already fought battles and emerged victorious. Perhaps a little bloodied and damaged, but ultimately alive. They let themselves believe that was all that mattered.

He’d let himself buy into the larger than life personality of Bellamy Blake, had forgotten that he was still little more than a kid himself. He was capable, he was strong, and he had a quiet sort of grounding that made it hard to remember that he’d been a director of chaos for the first weeks on the ground. He may be older than the rest of the Delinquents, but that didn’t make him exempt from the worry _someone_ should have had for him.

Aurora had been his friend. They’d grown up together, only a few years apart. And even has he’d walked her to the air lock, she’d only asked one thing of him – not to let her go, no pleading for mercy. She’d simply asked that he watch out for her children, because they would have no one else.

How miserably he had failed her.

He didn’t even realize that there were tears in his eyes until suddenly the image of Bellamy blurred in front of him, and he swiped angrily at them. Tears helped no one, and he blamed the exhaustion on the sudden emotion.

“Sor-” he was mid apology when suddenly he felt light fingers on the back of his hand, so unexpectedly it took him a moment to realize who it was.

Bellamy had a tentative hand out, barely brushing against the back of Kane’s, patiently waiting for Kane to look at him. As soon as their eyes met, he offered a smile – not a real one, just the cautious curve of the corner of his mouth.

Kane didn’t say a word. He hardly breathed. This was the first time Bellamy had shown even a mild understanding of the world around him – and all he could think of were those stupid children’s movies that the Ark would play on the network where someone inevitably tried to tame a wild thing.

Without a sound, Bellamy carefully slid his fingers over Kane’s knuckles, taking hold of his hand and pulling it gently towards him. Kane let him.

He had no idea what he was trying to communicate with him, and he wasn’t sure where Bellamy was going, until the tips of his finger’s brushed against the crescent scar across his temple.

Bellamy kept the light grip on his hand, tracing the line with the tips of Kane’s fingers briefly, before he let go, his one blind eye staring just as fixedly as his sighted one.

Kane still didn’t understand what Bellamy was trying to tell him. Was he blaming him? This is what his oversight had cost him?

He went to pull his hand back, but Bellamy caught it easily, pulling it back to where the obvious and damaging scar was. This time, he pressed Kane’s fingers slightly harder against his skin, tapping lightly.

Goddamn that kid.

He wasn’t _blaming_ Kane for anything. He was trying to convince him that _he was okay_. That this didn’t hurt anymore because see? You can touch it and it doesn’t hurt.

And it was something more than that – the way that Bellamy held his hand in place, long and scarred fingers wrapped gently around his wrist to hold him there…it was an expression of trust. Literal blind trust that he wouldn’t do anything to hurt him further.

God _damn_ him.

Because Kane was the last person in Arkadia that deserved that kind of faith. Especially from someone like Bellamy, so recently and permanently damaged at the hands of another.

He let his hand linger on Bellamy’s skin, and he didn’t protest.

“You’re so much like your mother,” he said, the thought escaping before he’d even fully realized he’d said it out loud, and he winced as soon as he did.  

Bellamy didn’t. He actually looked relieved, and it took a moment to realize why he might.

“Everyone said you must look like your father, huh?”

Bellamy barely moved his head, but the nod was there.

Kane allowed himself a small smile. “Yeah. Octavia looks more like her. But she’s fire and wildness…your mom was…” he struggled for the words. Aurora had been a voice of reason. She was quiet and brilliant and creative and… “kind. You have her smile.”

And her soul.

He couldn’t bring himself to tell him that what he saw Aurora the most in were his smiles. Aurora had never been particularly talkative, but she could have a whole conversation with someone through just her smiles. She could beam from ear to ear when she was happy, or offer a sly little smirk when she’d managed to outwit someone. There were times when she smiled when she thought no one could see her, and it was one of the most tragic things Kane had ever seen…and he’d felt guilty somehow for seeing it.

 There was a wide, almost child-like wonderment in Bellamy’s eyes, and it struck him that this was probably the only time anyone ever spoke of Aurora beyond her choice to have a second child. The dead weren’t often talked about, whether in good context or bad, and from what Kane could remember, Bellamy had isolated himself as much as one could on a floating space station after her death.

At the time, it hadn’t struck him as being particularly odd – Bellamy was often a loner, and after Octavia was discovered, it was apparent that it was because he spent his time with his little sister. But what Bellamy lacked in social grace and niceties was made up for in spades by the fact that he’d spent his whole life looking after people. He looked after his mother and his sister, and now on the Ground he’d managed to adopt 100 more.

“Don’t worry about Pike,” Kane said, softly. “I know you’re not dangerous.”

Because when presented with the impossible choice of going through what he did, or allowing another to take his place, Bellamy’s first instinct wasn’t violence.

It was to throw himself between it and everyone else.

Bellamy looked away, suddenly more interested in the blankets that he was with Kane. Like he didn’t believe him, but didn’t want to argue.

Kane moved his hand from Bellamy’s temple where it’d been hovering, absently tracing the thin line across his skin without thought, gently turning his chin to redirect Bellamy back to him.

“You’re _not_ dangerous,” Kane repeated. “You defended yourself without being aware of your surroundings. That’s it. You’re _allowed_ to defend yourself, Bellamy.”

Even if he shouldn’t have to, because dammit…the adults owed him the lives of their children.

Bellamy didn’t look convinced, and Kane made a desperate attempt to get through to him that this time, he didn’t have to fight alone.

He tapped Bellamy’s arm where the sleeve had pulled up almost to his elbow, the much too large shirt pooling around the joint.

The scars still stood out in stark contrast, silvery pale against olive colored skin. Somehow the clinical detachment in them was worse than any form of rage fueled cruelty, but those weren’t the ones he pointed out. His fingers touched on the raised, ridged scar tissue around his wrist. Scars that only had one explanation.

“You understood that when you were in the mountain, didn’t you?” Kane asked, barely above a whisper. “That’s what these are from. But you were alone then. You let them do this to you, didn’t you, but you still fought.”

Kane didn’t know, not for sure, if that’s what happened. But he was an intelligent man, and he could guess well enough from Jasper’s vague explanations and Monty’s immediate reaction when asked about Bellamy.

But mostly he remembered Jasper’s desperate attempt to make sure Bellamy received care, even if he didn’t want it. Bellamy only tried to get away until there was a perceived threat to someone he thought he was responsible for. Even when he pulled Kane’s gun, he’d done it only when he thought they were in danger.

It didn’t take a genius to understand what Bellamy had done for the kids in Mount Weather.

“You don’t have to protect anyone here, kid. The Forty Seven are safe. They’re home with their parents for the first time in months. You did your job. Now trust us to do ours, and let us protect _you_ for once.”

Kane felt like he was asking for the moon.

As he held his breath, waiting for any indication that Bellamy not only heard him but _understood_ , he saw the tension in Bellamy’s shoulders ease.

With a quiet huff that Kane interpreted as ‘fine. You win. For _now_ ,’ Bellamy allowed his eyes to slide shut and pressed his face into the blankets, curling into himself in a way that made it obvious he was done with the conversation.

In moments, Kane could hear his breathing even out as he fell into an actual, honest sleep and that was all he needed to allow himself the same luxury.

He was asleep before he remembered he was still clutching Bellamy’s arm, and Bellamy hadn’t shrugged it off.


	9. Chapter 9

When Bellamy woke next, Kane was gone. The pillow was still on the floor where he’d seen him last, but the man had disappeared.

He reached a cautious hand out, carefully touching the pillow and feeling no residual warmth. Kane had been gone for a while.

Actually…he carefully rolled his shoulders, and straightened his legs out so they reached over the side of the blanket pile. Octavia was gone too. His sleep addled brain obliged him with every possible scenario available, everything as benign as simply needing food and to stretch their legs, or there was another emergency with the camp that required all available hands.

Without thinking, he shoved his hands underneath him and pushed himself upright. The world swum dizzyingly, and he put his hand out to catch himself – completely forgetting just how much that arm hurt as it collapsed back under him.

“You know, I _was_ going to wait and see how far you got before you managed to maim yourself again, but that was pretty pathetic. You didn’t even make it off the bed. Why does Kane think you need babysitting?” a familiar voice drawled sardonically.

Bellamy blinked, turning his head so he could see the other side of the room beyond his blinded eye. It was a little lighter than it had been, and he could at least see the small room. Not that he really had any idea where it was, because he hadn’t been in Arkadia long enough to receive sleeping quarters. He was actually a little surprised he was neither in medical, or in a broom closet.

Murphy sat nearby, using a dulled knife to carve a small piece of wood in his hand. “You know, Bell, you didn’t make out half bad.”

When Bellamy didn’t answer, Murphy seemed unperturbed and continued on. “No, really. You at least got to be inside. Nice climate controlled kennel from what I hear. Yeah, okay,” he admitted, shooting Bellamy a slightly abashed smirk, “in exchange you were horribly tortured and experimented on, which sucks. I would know. I’m currently at _least_ two torture sessions up on you.”

The other boy continued on conversationally, digging at the piece of wood he held.

“But I’ll concede that maybe we can count your one stint as at _least_ two since you were held for longer,” Murphy said. “But you miss counting it as a solid three only because you got released without being a part of a biological warfare tactic carrying a hemorrhagic fever that infected everyone at the camp.”

Murphy scooted closer, and Bellamy drew up his legs to make room for his former lieutenant.

“But I’ll tell you what. _I_ would totally trade you – because I can rock an eyepatch like nobody’s business – your trauma inducing nightmarish stint as a human lab rat for my six _fucking weeks in the desert with Jaha_.” Murphy suddenly flung his hand up, making Bellamy flinch, revealing a small, wooden effigy. One that was clearly meant to be the former Chancellor, except a complete caricature – one eye was bigger than the other making the doll look deranged, mouth carved into an ‘o’ like he was yelling and one hand raised upwards towards the sky.

“SIX fucking weeks in the desert with _Jaha_ ,” Murphy repeated, shaking the doll for effect. “You thought he was bad onboard the Ark?” He laughed. “Try listening to him go on and _on_ about some goddamn promised land in the middle of fucking nowhere for a month and a half! Always ‘it’s a test of our faith, John’, and ‘if it’s your time John, nothing can save you’, or ‘the City of Light is real!’. I would’ve shot him if some bitch hadn’t stolen my goddamn gun on the second day! There were minefields! More crazy people trying to kill us! No food, no water, no _nothing_ because _apparently_ , Bellamy, man can live off faith a-fucking-lone! And what did we find?! _Solar panel city_!”

Murphy shook the doll again. “ _This_ asshole – I would trade _every_ day you had in that mountain if it meant I could go back in time and punch myself in the fucking throat for thinking going off with the batshit crazy Chancellor Psychopath was a good idea! I would _happily_ trade torture by the Grounders again. I was actually kind of getting used to it, you know? I can take a beating. I can take pretty much anything those dicks could throw at me because at least _they shut up_ once in a while!”

He wrapped his fist around the effigy, squeezing the life out of it as if it were Jaha himself. “I’ve found religion, Bell.” He broke off one of the doll’s legs. “ _Voodoo_. Wherever that asshat is, I hope he has a broken leg. Trips over a mine and gets blown up. Pecked to death by birds. _Spontaneous human combustion_.”

He gave the doll one last shake.

“Ah, who am I kidding…he fell from space in a missile casing and walked away from it. That bastard is probably on par with a cockroach for staying power – even in the post nuclear apocalyptic desert.” Murphy sniffed, wiping the back of his hand across his nose. “This is surprisingly therapeutic, actually. Wanna try?” He held out the broken wooden figure.

Bellamy didn’t reach for it. He stared at Murphy, both eyes wide, and one hand pressed over his mouth. His shoulders shook, barely noticeable at first until almost his entire body was shaking, and he put his second hand up to his mouth, covering the first.

Murphy frowned, noticing the crinkling around Bellamy’s eyes, the way that it was mostly his shoulders that were moving, and there was an actual sort of rhythm to the motion.

“Are you…are you _laughing_ at me?” Murphy demanded.

Bellamy nodded silently, pulling his hands away from his mouth to reveal the ear to ear, shit eating grin.

“I shared a _moment_ with you, you dick!” Murphy shouted, throwing his effigy at his friend who easily caught it. “I thought we were _bonding_ , and instead you _mock_ my pain?”

Bellamy was in tears as he laughed, which sounded strange by itself considering his voice was gone. It sounded like a chuffing noise, somewhere between a laugh and a cough but that was the first honest to God _smile_ Bellamy had shown since coming back to camp. It was the first time someone had raised a voice around him that hadn’t sent him cowering into a corner, or completely withdraw back into his rocking. 

Murphy was perfectly fine with being laughed at by Bellamy Blake.

“Are you done?” he asked, trying to keep the smirk off his face.

Yeah, okay, he and Bellamy had their differences. Bellamy let the 100 try to hang him, he tried to hang Bellamy…details. For once in his life, Murphy was beginning to let grudges go. Not necessarily because he was a better person, but because he was running low on options. The winds were shifting the camp, and he, for one, was not liking the direction they were going.

Bellamy finally stopped his rather disturbing silent laughter, making a gesture with his free hand.

“Oh, come on. You know I don’t understand that crap,” Murphy grumbled. “Mouth it if you have to. Or should I find a pencil and a paper to write on?”

Bellamy waved him off, pushing himself into a sitting position with himself propped against the wall, but still mostly on his small mountain of blankets. He pointed to the empty spot on the floor where Kane’s discarded pillow was, then stuck up three fingers to form a ‘W’.

“Where’s Kane and Octavia? I don’t know where she went, but she said she’d be back soon, and Kane went to go talk to Jaha and Pike about you and the other kids.”

Bellamy cocked his head to the side questioningly, then held up his index finger, drawing it in a quick circle. 

It took a second for Murphy to guess at that one, and he immediately frowned. “Seriously, dude? You _just_ woke up out of a mini coma. You have like…one good appendage to your name, and Abby finally said your fever was down from ‘brain boiling’ to ‘simmer’. And you want to know how the rest of the camp is?”

Bellamy folded his arms over his chest, fighting back a wince when he moved his aching shoulder. He could tell it was at least in place for now, but considering how many times he’d popped it in the last month and a half, it always felt…loose.

Murphy met his glare with one of his own, and crossed his arms too, mirroring the older boy. “And if I don’t?”

Bellamy didn’t budge. Murphy knew he couldn’t see out of one eye, but damned if he could tell. It glared at him with the same intensity Bellamy was always capable of.

Murphy sighed, tossing the remnants of his Jaha effigy against the wall. “I don’t know why everyone is bitching that you can’t talk,” he grumbled. “Not like you were a man of many words to begin with.”

Bellamy drummed his fingers, slowly and deliberately on his own arm. _I’m waiting_ , Murphy.

“Fine, fine, _fine_. Where should I start? That jackass Pike is in charge, in case you didn’t know. You know, that Earth Skills teacher we all had to listen to before we got ejected from the Ark?” Murphy snapped his fingers, exaggerating his surprise. “Oh, wait, you didn’t have to go through that because you didn’t actually commit a crime until we were about to leave. Guess you paid attention the first time, huh? Anyway. Where was I? Right. Asshat in charge. And guess who his best friend is?”

Bellamy hardly raised an eyebrow, but Murphy took it as an enthusiastic ‘Who, Murphy?!’ and continued on.

“Your old buddy Jaha. Yeah. I don’t remember if you were still around when he left, but he took like ten of us off into the middle of the desert trying to find this god-forsaken missing city or something that a bunch of radioactive freaks told him about when they found him in the desert. But you already got the highlight reel of that – bee tee dubs, I was the only one besides him that came back alive. So that was fun. Got some sunburn. Got to see some people blow up. Good times, good times. So by the time we got back from Jaha’s failed crusade, Arkadia picked up the survivors from Farm Station – Pike included, and whatshisface’s mom.” Murphy snapped his fingers trying to remember his name. “The Spaz’s smart friend.”

Bellamy raised an eyebrow, then held up his hand, forming a fist with his three middle fingers curled over his thumb.

“Monty! Right, right. Okay, so he’s got his mom back, and Pike got voted in because at the time Jaha was wandering the desert and apparently Kane and Abby were too preoccupied with you guys in the mountain to run the place. Pike’s not _all_ bad, but…” Murphy trailed off, looking away and down at his hands.

Bellamy picked up something small off the floor – it’s not like housekeeping was high on their list of priorities at the moment – and flicked it at Murphy. If he’d been sitting closer, he would’ve kicked him, but Murphy was on the other side of the room and well out of reach.

It did the trick and bounced off Murphy’s hands, forcing him to look up. Bellamy put his index finger against his lips and then drew it down to his chest. _Tell me_.

Murphy didn’t answer immediately, his lips pressing into a thin line. “Pike’s dangerous. Jaha was bad, but he’s crazy and easy to ignore. Pike _isn’t_. They had some issues with the Grounders when they crashed. Most of Farm Station was killed – including the kids. And no one really knows what the hell is going on anymore.”

Bellamy held up the same hand again, all five fingers splayed out facing his chest, and then quickly drew it left to right, closing his fingers as he did so. _And_?

Murphy huffed. “Look, man. I know you want to know what’s going on, but so does everyone else, and we _don’t know_. We haven’t seen the Grounders in weeks – almost as soon as you disappeared. Clarke vanished for a couple days after you, and when she came back, she didn’t explain where she’d been, or what the hell happened because we haven’t seen anyone in the woods since. Pike thinks they’re gearing up for attack, even though Clarke swears they aren’t. Jaha thinks – _fuck_ if I know what that guy thinks, but he’s siding with Pike’s idea of everyone should be worried. Everyone’s on edge. I just try to stay away from it.”

Bellamy considered the information for a moment, then held his hand out, clenched with his thumb pointing straight up before pivoting his wrist so his thumb pointed to the right. With the same hand, he held his index and pinky fingers out, placing them just under his nose and bobbing it up and down several times.

Murphy stared blankly at him for a moment. “You do remember I was only at camp for like two weeks, right? You’re lucky I remember as much as I do.”

Bellamy huffed, and instead of repeating the gesture, he formed a different one, moving his open palm downwards in a step pattern.

“Kids?” Murphy guessed, and Bellamy nodded, offering a quick smile to let him know he’d guessed right.

“You want to know about the other kids?”

Again, Bellamy nodded.

Murphy sighed, leaning back against the wall so he was facing opposite Bellamy. “They’re fine. All of the ones that came back with you, which was like Forty-Seven. Forty-Eight, with you included. Monty and Jasper are back with Monty’s mom, Miller’s dad hasn’t let him out of his sight since he got back. Everyone’s fine, which is more than can be said for you.”

Bellamy suddenly found the floor fascinating.

“Are you going to pout until I prove it to you?”

Bellamy glanced wistfully at the door, and Murphy sighed dramatically. “Abby said to come and get her if you woke up anyway. How about a short walk over instead? I mean, I know it’s a medical ward, so it’s probably not top on your list of places to go, but at least we can test out your leg – see if it works again.”

As Murphy helped him stand, he muttered quietly under his breath. “If Kane tries to kill me over this, I’d appreciate you telling him it was your idea.”

*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)

In retrospect, Murphy probably should’ve worried less about Pike and Jaha, and more about how quickly word travelled in a tiny camp.

“You’re not doing half bad,” Murphy said appraisingly. And he meant it. He’d seen the shape Bellamy was in when Kane first dragged and then carried him across camp. The simple fact that Bellamy wasn’t _dead_ was better than expected. 

Bellamy squinted in the sunlight, raising one hand to shield his eye. It wasn’t particularly sunny out – it never was, it seemed – but Murphy wasn’t entirely sure how long he’d been in artificial lighting, or even just low lighting. His naturally darker skin looked paler than usual, but that probably had just as much to do with significant blood loss than anything else.

What Murphy cared about though, was that despite standing slightly crookedly, he was still _standing_. On his own.

He took a step back from Bellamy, hands half raised with his palms upwards as if to catch him if he fell. “Take a couple steps. I wanna see how well you do.”

Bellamy raised an eyebrow at him, and Murphy shrugged. “What? You want me to hold your hand instead? I ain’t Jasper. This is as friendly as I’m going to get.”

The older boy made a face, clearly as thrilled with the idea of having to use Murphy as a crutch as he was, but he took a cautious step forward. His right leg definitely dragged, but at least he could put weight on it.

“Well, it’s been three days since Abby fixed it, so – what? Why are you looking at me like that?”

Bellamy’s mouth dropped open in disbelief, mouthing the words again. _Three days_?

Murphy frowned. “Yeah, it’s been like four or five days since you got back.”

Bellamy looked faintly green, and for a moment Murphy thought he was going to be sick. Instead, he started rapidly gesturing, so fast that Murphy could hardly make out a word.

“Hey, hey, _hey!_ ” Murphy snapped, harsher than he meant to but it still got Bellamy’s attention, his hands freezing midair. “You _know_ I hate it when you do that, right? Not everyone is O. But taking a wild stab here, I’m gonna guess you didn’t know how long you’d been out?”

Bellamy swallowed thickly, looking more embarrassed than panicked now, which Murphy took as a good sign. At least he wasn’t turning white, which is what he _was_ doing. Murphy tried to remember what he needed to know when he was a recently escaped prisoner, but his point of view was slightly skewed. Bellamy hadn’t been the only prisoner; he hadn’t been taken alone – he’d been with half of the population of the prison block. And unlike Murphy, Bellamy actually gave a shit about the others.

“It’s only three days,” Murphy said firmly. “You only missed three. It hasn’t been weeks. They didn’t put you out, you were just sleeping on your own. Other than your leg, nothing else happened.” As an afterthought, he added, “No one else is sick.”

From the way Bellamy took a steadying breath, and the look of relief that washed across his face, Murphy knew he’d guessed the problem. The last time something like this happened, Murphy was the one in Bellamy’s place – and people had died from the following fever.

“Ready to go back inside?” he asked, even though he doubted it. Especially not now that Bellamy realized how long he’d been asleep. Being confined for a month and a half would make anyone stir crazy.

Bellamy didn’t have a chance to answer.

“ _Bellamy_!” someone shouted, and Bellamy pivoted on his good leg fast enough Murphy recognized it what it for what it was.

Familiarity.

Bellamy hadn’t been able to use two legs long enough for him to reflexively keep his weight on one.

The voice belonged to Harper, and the girl came jogging over – barely restrained from bolting, but even Murphy could see the ear to ear smile on her face.

He didn’t think Harper _ever_ smiled.

Murphy half expected Bellamy to panic, like he’d heard about when Bellamy almost shot two of Pike’s guards.

Instead, as soon as Bellamy realized who it was, he completely forgot he had no voice, her name coming out as more of a breath of air than the exclamation he obviously intended as he held his arms open.

That was all the invitation she needed, because Harper’s slow jog became a sprint for the last few yards as she threw herself into Bellamy’s arms – hard enough to make Bellamy rock backwards slightly on impact, but she apparently knew about his leg, too, because she almost immediately pulled him back in a fierce hug.

“Thank _God_ you’re okay!” Harper said.

At least, that’s what it sounded like, because Harper had basically buried her face in Bellamy’s chest and it came out rather muffled.

Stranger still, Bellamy didn’t look at all awkward in Harper’s embrace, returning it with the same energy. Actually…he looked _relieved_. It was like Murphy could see a physical weight lifted from him, and the shoulders that he hadn’t even realized had been hunched over, bracing for something that Murphy didn’t understand and only noticed when it was gone.

Harper roughly pushed back from Bellamy, enough so she could see his face and Murphy felt like an intruder.

“We thought…when Miller…” she couldn’t finish a sentence, caught between laughing and crying and Murphy didn’t even know Harper was _capable_ of crying. “We thought you were _dead_.”

 Bellamy didn’t seem to care about what Harper could possibly think, instead keeping her at arm’s length, head tilting from one side to the other as he looked her up and down.

If anyone else had looked at Harper with that kind of intensity, Murphy was pretty sure they’d get slapped.

But she seemed to understand what he was looking for, because she pushed up both sleeves to her elbows, turning them up to face Bellamy. They were smooth and unblemished, and still pale from spending months indoors.

“I’m fine,” she said, smiling gently. “All of us.”

So _that’s_ what Bellamy was worried about.

No matter how many times or how many people tried to tell him, he still hadn’t believed that the others were okay. Other than Jasper, no one had been allowed to see him, and that had only been the first day. Strict orders not only from Abby and Kane, but from Pike, too.

Judging from Harper’s reaction, she’d needed this as much as Bellamy did because for the first time in the history of Harper as Murphy knew her, she was genuinely _smiling_.

And again, she seemed to understand more about Bellamy than he did, because she was very purposely standing to one side where he could see her, and she didn’t appear at all surprised that he didn’t talk. Sure, rumors got around camp, but Harper was reacting with practiced ease.

Perhaps that was why, now that his fever had degraded down to ‘slightly elevated’, Bellamy still seemed like _Bellamy_. Because whatever was wrong with him, whatever was broken…had been broken for a while. Long enough for others to adapt to him.

If Harper had been the only one to notice Bellamy was up and about, they might’ve been okay. Murphy was already getting ready to break up the happy reunion with some well-placed sarcasm when someone else noticed that Bellamy was out.

It might not have even been so bad if it had been another kid – _any_ other kid, but it wasn’t. It was David Miller, Nathan’s dad and head of the guard.

It didn’t even occur to Murphy to warn him because Bellamy seemed like his normal self for those two minutes with Harper. Murphy could deal with physical injuries – those were obvious. They made sense. You learned to get around them. But somehow, Murphy fell into the trap of forgetting there were so many other, _worse_ things to remember than just not being able to see out of one eye or balance on both feet.

And part of it was David Miller was the least threatening of the adults outside Abby and Kane just now. If it had been Jaha, or Pike, or hell – Mrs. Green – Murphy would’ve said something, but it wasn’t. All Murphy saw was someone who looked just as happy to see Bellamy up and about as Harper did.

“Hey, Bellamy, I just wanted to say-” Miller didn’t even get the whole sentence out as he reached a hand for Bellamy’s arm. Not even to grab him – just to clap him on the shoulder like the man would’ve done a dozen times when Bellamy was still in the Guard.

He’d barely touched him when Bellamy jumped, spinning around so fast he stumbled over his bad leg and tripping into Harper. She caught him, just barely, but mostly because he’d had his hand out to brace against her, or even to shield her, Murphy couldn’t tell, his other arm coming up fast enough that if it _hadn’t_ been David, Bellamy would’ve broken his arm.

Murphy didn’t even know Bellamy could move that fast. _Or_ David. He’d managed to jerk his hand back fast enough that Bellamy’s wild swing missed his arm, barely brushing past his sleeve instead.

Judging from the look of surprise on his face, Bellamy hadn’t missed because David moved. He’d most likely missed because his depth perception was off.

David held up both hands, shoulder height in the universal sign of surrender. “Sorry!” he apologized quickly, glancing between Murphy and Harper. “I didn’t mean to startle you, Bell. I just…I wanted to say thanks.”

Bellamy was breathing hard, the familiar confidence Murphy knew gone. Part of it Murphy understood – that need to get away from unknown hands and unknown faces because everything _hurt_ , but...there was something else there, too. Not just the wild need to get away, because Bellamy hadn’t. But for a moment too long for Murphy’s comfort, there was something _savage_ there too.

Abby was wrong. Bellamy wasn’t a frightened rabbit.

Bellamy was a wounded _predator_.

David seemed to understand it too, because he took a step back, hands still up. “Bell, it’s me. Nathan’s father. Look –“ He moved his hands just enough to indicate them. “Empty. Nothing here.”

Nathan’s name, more than anything else, seemed to be what got through to Bellamy, and he blinked slowly. And then suddenly flushed scarlet in embarrassment.

He clenched his fist, drawing a quick circle over his chest.

“He says he’s sorry,” Murphy translated. David looked more surprised that Murphy understood the gesture than he did when Bellamy snapped at him, and he shrugged. “I had a lot of down time in prison.”

“Can he hear?” David asked, and Murphy saw a flash of irritation across Bellamy’s face.

“Yeah,” Murphy said. “He can hear just fine. He just can’t talk.”

David looked relieved, dropping his hands. “I’m sorry. I just…I’ve been wanting to talk to you ever since you got back, but Kane said you weren’t up for visitors. And I just saw you, and…without you, I never would’ve gotten Nate back. I wouldn’t even know if he was dead or alive, so…thank you.”

Bellamy shot a bewildered glance over at Murphy, like he wasn’t entirely sure how to answer that. Murphy shrugged.

 _You’re on your own_.

“Uh, Bell?” David said hesitantly. When Bellamy turned his face back to him, David gestured at his feet. “Did you know you’re bleeding?”

Murphy glanced down just as Bellamy did. The bandages he’d had had held up fine when Bellamy was barely managing a shuffling limp, but he’d torn them free when he’d spun around. And now that Murphy wasn’t preoccupied with making sure Bellamy didn’t maim anyone, he realized not only was his foot bleeding through the bandages, he also wasn’t putting any weight on his right leg again.

Kane was going to _murder_ him.

“Come on,” Murphy sighed. “Maybe Abby can fix you up before Kane gets back. Then I might have a chance of living to see tomorrow.”

(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*

Kane was ready to throttle John Murphy.

No, that wasn’t really true. Murphy couldn’t really be blamed for Bellamy wanting to get up and out of the room. In fairness, Kane was more irritated at himself for leaving for such long time. Bellamy had been spending less time asleep, though he never seemed very aware when he woke. Not because he was still sick (which he was), but because he was just too damned tired to register anything. At most, he managed a little water and then would promptly fall back asleep.

Octavia called it hibernation mode, and Abby said it wasn’t wholly inaccurate. Bellamy had been _so_ sick for _so_ long that as soon as his body understood that it _could_ rest, that was all he wanted to do.

He hadn’t wanted to leave Bellamy alone with Murphy, (or anyone really, but he tried to ignore that stab of paternal paranoia), but Jaha and Pike wouldn’t wait. They’d waited long enough, they said, and if Kane wasn’t going to go to them, then they were simply going to have the meeting with Bellamy still in the room.

For as long as they were talking though, they hadn’t accomplished or agreed on anything concerning the Mountain Men, or the Forty-Seven, or Bellamy. If it hadn’t been politics, Kane would’ve been suspicious.

When Murphy came running in to explain what happened, Kane was almost relieved – any excuse to get out of the meeting. And then the more Murphy explained, the feeling of relief was replaced with dread. Bellamy’s reaction to medical and Abby had been what Pike and Jaha harped on the most. They couldn’t afford to lose their only doctor to a delusional would-be assassin, and with the extensive injuries Bellamy had, there wasn’t an option of simply letting them heal on their own.

Kane practically skidded into the medical bay, positive he was going to find a scene similar to the one when Bellamy had first been brought in.

Instead, he thought he was going to pass out from relief.

Bellamy was obviously coherent, but clearly frustrated with Abby, who was just as exasperated. He was sitting on a stool instead of the exam table, which was probably Abby’s compromise to try and alleviate some of Bellamy’s anxiety.

Bellamy waved his hand angrily, making deliberate movements that clearly Abby didn’t understand.

“Bell, I _know_ you don’t like being in here, and I’m _trying_ to get you out as soon as possible but you have to let me see your feet and I _need_ to check on your back if you want to be able to walk normally again,” Abby said irritably.

Abby hardly ever lost her temper with a patient, so whatever argument they were having had clearly been going on a while.

“What’s going on?” Kane said, trying to control his breathing enough that they wouldn’t know he’d sprinted the length of the camp to get there.

Abby gestured at Bellamy, who folded his arms defiantly across his chest. “Bellamy decided to go for a walk and accidentally shredded his bandages. Murphy said he might’ve reinjured his back too, because he’s back to not bearing weight on it, but he won’t let me take a look.”

Bellamy’s lip curled upwards in a silent snarl, waving his hand again.

Abby sighed. “He also keeps flailing around every time I try to get near him.”

Bellamy repeated the gesture, clearly becoming exasperated because his hands starting losing their formation, moving faster as he went.

Kane felt the corner of his mouth quirk up into a smile. “He’s not flailing,” he said, chuckling. “He’s trying to talk to you.”

Bellamy swiveled his head so he could see Kane, and the look of hope in his eye was almost tangible. He repeated the gesture, slower this time, and very specifically at Kane.

“Of course you know sign language,” Kane said, shaking his head. “You always had your nose in a book.” He pulled his sleeves up, leaving his hands free. “You’ll have to forgive me,” he said, moving his hands slowly in the patterns he remembered. “It’s been a while since I even tried this.”

The smile that lit up Bellamy’s face was worth the effort. He’d forgotten that kid could smile with his entire being if he wanted to, and for a moment, all he could see was Aurora.

“Can you repeat that last sign?” he asked, again repeating everything he said with his hands. His mother had taught him _eons_ ago, when he was still enamored with the cleric duties. There were a few parishioners who worked in engineering and had lost all but the last remnants of hearing. While his mother gave her sermon, he would use the sign language she’d been taught decades earlier by the prior minister to repeat the words to the couple so that they, too, could be a part of the mass. It wasn’t necessarily supposed to be a bimodal language, but he couldn’t help the repetition of the words with hand gestures, even though Bellamy clearly wasn’t deaf. It was simply the only way he remembered it.

Bellamy repeated it slower this time, enunciating with his hands the same way someone would with spoken words. At the end of the sentence, he glanced up at Abby, who was staring at Kane in shock.

“You know sign language too?” she asked incredulously. “Since when?”

Kane shrugged. “Since I was little. I wasn’t always a council member, after all. I had hobbies.”

“What’s he saying?” she asked.

Bellamy reached up and grabbed her chin, not painfully tight but enough to get her attention and forcing her to look back at him. He made the same set of signs, this time with near violent deliberation – the unspoken version of yelling, and he made them towards Abby.

Kane cleared his throat. “He says stop talking around him. That he’s right here, and he can hear you just fine.”

“I’m sorry-” Abby said, turning back to Kane and before he could say anything, Bellamy’s hand shot up again, turning her back towards him.

In the same deliberate, silent yelling, Bellamy signed rapidly and Kane translated, the memories of the language coming back as Bellamy signed at Abby.

“Talk to _him_ ,” Kane said. “Not to me. He’s the one that has to talk through me, not you. He can still hear you, and he can still see you, _why_ can’t you see him?”

Bellamy’s lips pressed into a firm line, and he blinked rapidly. He made another set of gestures, but the aggression was gone. At the end of every sentence, Bellamy allowed his hands to drop even further into his lap.

“He says you need to ask,” Kane translated as Bellamy’s hands moved. “You can’t just do something without explaining it. You _need_ to talk to him and stop acting like he’s invisible, or like he’s a rat in a cage that can’t understand you. You need to ask before…” and Kane stumbled over the next words, feeling his heart sink at the gestures.

Even Bellamy’s hands were shaking, and his eyes had taken on a suspiciously bright gleam to them.

Kane took a shuddering breath before repeating it aloud. “You need to ask before…before you hurt him.”

As if on reflex, Abby turned towards Kane and he didn’t blame her. People had a habit of looking at the person who was actually voicing the words, instead of to the person who was _trying_ to talk to them. The deaf couple he knew were considerably more forgiving than Bellamy though, but Kane couldn’t blame him either because he was clearly getting upset by her unwillingness to _look_ at him when she answered.

This time when she looked away, when she opened her mouth to reply back to Kane instead of to Bellamy, Bellamy grabbed her chin again, this time painfully tight as he wrenched her back around to look at him. This time, Bellamy signed with one hand, but he moved his mouth so he could reinforce the words.

The once beaming smile was gone, and had he still his voice, Bellamy would be screaming. He was upset enough that the tears tracking silently down his cheeks went unnoticed. He finally let go of Abby’s chin, and repeated the last gesture, the aggressive punctuation reinforced with him still mouthing the words with the same deliberation.

“Look at me,” Kane said, voice barely above a whisper. “I’m still here. I am _still_ here.”


	10. Chapter 10

Abby stared at him, jaw dropped in shock. Bellamy was shaking, though Kane wasn’t sure if it was from anger, or he just couldn’t help it, being back in a hospital setting. Probably both. He looked so utterly miserable and lost – caught between _knowing_ what needed to be done, and the memories Kane tried not to imagine.

He looked younger than Kane could ever remember, but he was just as lost. Bellamy clearly didn’t want to be touched, but it was just as obvious he needed _something_. Some _one_.

“Bellamy?” Kane said, so quietly he wasn’t sure the kid would hear him, but his face turned back towards him and away from Abby. “We can do this later, if you want. Or we can get Octavia or even Jasper if it would make you feel better.”

Bellamy opened his mouth to answer, his hands moving in turn to sign, but he suddenly stopped. A flush of pink slowly crept up his neck and he looked away, back down at his hands.

Kane could’ve kicked himself. This was why he wasn’t a parent and why he was a terrible cleric. It always took a moment too long for him to realize what he’d said was a bad idea. He’d given Bellamy no good way out of his situation – admit that he needed someone to essentially hold his hand, not be capable of enduring it at _all_ , or force him to endure something he clearly he didn’t want to just to prove a point.

Rather than wait for him to answer, Kane glanced over at Abby. “What exactly are you trying to do?”

“When Murphy brought him in, he was dragging his bad leg again. I need to make sure he hasn’t started another subdermal bleed in spinal area,” she said, clearly still frustrated, but not at Bellamy. She was angry at the whole situation.

Which meant that Bellamy was going to have to lie down again, face down, on one of the exam tables. No surprise there that he was resisting.

“Can I have a minute to talk to him?” Kane asked, making a subtle head shake towards the door. Abby, bless her heart, understood immediately.

“Yeah, sure. I need to go restock some supplies anyway. I’ll be back in about…twenty minutes?” she guessed, tone light. “Miller’s son had a few bad cuts I’d like to check on too.”

She disappeared through the door, taking her medical bag with her and left the door open, which Kane was grateful for. Less like they’d been locked in.

As soon as she was gone, Bellamy visibly relaxed. Not by much, but enough that instead of sitting stiff and unmoving, his shoulders slumped as he hunched forwards, sighing.

“How are you doing, kiddo?” Kane asked, pulling up another stool so he wasn’t looking down on Bellamy.

Bellamy put his hand to his chest, his right thumb touching his sternum and wiggled his fingers back and forth.

“Fine, huh?” Kane said with a rueful grin. “You don’t look fine. You look _better_ , but there was a lot of room for improvement from when you first arrived.”

Bellamy looked away without saying anything, clenching his jaw shut.

“Can I ask you something?” Kane asked quietly.

He watched as Bellamy’s grip tightened on the stool he was sitting on, knuckles turning white, but he kept his gaze away.

Kane continued on anyway.

“I know you’ve been through a lot, Bellamy. More than anyone should. I don’t pretend to understand what happened in the Mountain. But if you were me, and you were one of the kids – one of the Forty Seven…what would say to them? Right now, what would you tell Jasper or Harper?”

Bellamy shook his head, his grip tightening even further on the stool but refused to answer.

Kane sighed, running a hand through his hair. “You’re going to have to be more specific, Bell. No, you wouldn’t say anything to them? No, you don’t have an answer?”

Bellamy shook his head again, but this time he made a sign. He clenched both hands into fists, his thumbs across the outside of his fingers instead of tucked in, then deliberately moved them in a revolving circle around each other.

Kane opened his mouth for further clarification – because that sign could mean more than one thing. Difficult? Agony? Hard? Pain? But Bellamy continued on, not really making eye contact with him.

He gestured to the room, then used his right hand to point to his ear before holding both hands in front of him, flat with palms down in quick, alternate motions. He paused for a moment, and visibly blushed before making the same gesture, and then gently tapping his index finger to his temple.

“It’s difficult to hear…because it’s loud in here, and it’s loud in _here_?” Kane translated, echoing Bellamy’s movements with his own, hoping that’s what Bellamy meant.

Bellamy didn’t really give any indication if he was right or wrong, but half-heartedly touched a finger to his lips, drawing down over them, before sliding his palms against his cheeks, indicating the flush he already had.

Kane sighed, leaning forwards with his elbows on his knees as he shifted so Bellamy had to look at him. “You’re talking about flashbacks, right?”

)()()())()()()()()()()

Flashbacks seemed like such a mild term, but Bellamy didn’t know a word for what he felt – either spoken or in sign.

The nausea rising in the back of his throat that forced him to swallow convulsively to keep from throwing up. The racing of his heart every time he looked up and remembered where he was. Phantom pain from wounds that no longer existed except in memory. That his skin itched and burned like someone poured kerosene on an open sore.

Everything in this room reminded him of something he hated, of things he would rather forget but couldn’t because _everything_ seemed to trigger something. The smell of antiseptic. The feel of metal under his palms. The clank and whir of the machines and sight of various tools he was now all too familiar with.

It didn’t help that before _any_ of this, Bellamy didn’t like medical to begin with. He never liked going to see Abby, or any other doctor, for that matter. Something about doctors always made his skin crawl – the way they could smile kindly to your face before stabbing you with a needle as long as their finger, or how they could fight to preserve a life one moment and then stand beside the Chancellor as they were lead to the air lock.

But what was by far more frightening than the prospect of him being in a medical ward, was how people he _knew_ bled and morphed into people he wished he didn’t.

If he didn’t keep his eye on Abby, force himself to look at her face and study every familiar inch of it – remind himself that her hair was brown, not black, her skin was pale, not tan, she had no accent, she wasn’t wearing a sterile white coat…as long as he could see the difference, focus on them and remind himself it was _Abby_ ’ _s_ hands and not _Singh_ , he could force himself to see reality.

But she needed to see his back. She needed him to lie down, his face away from her where he _couldn’t see_. He couldn’t list the difference if he couldn’t see and her hands began to hurt. Old aches from the memory of needles in his spine and unable to move because if he did, it wouldn’t be just one leg that didn’t work.

Worse, lying down, he couldn’t tell her to stop. No voice and no hands and he couldn’t force himself to stay in the present where there was nothing there to keep him from moving away from her.

 “Bell?”

He hadn’t realized he’d closed his eyes.

“Bellamy?”

He still didn’t open them.

He _wanted_ to. But reality was bleeding again and unlike Abby, Kane didn’t look different _enough_. His hair was different…but not enough. His skin was different…but not enough. He was shorter…but not enough.

But unlike Abby, Kane _talked_ to him. It didn’t even matter what he said because all he needed was to hear the difference.

Cage was mocking. Cage was cruel. Cage was indifferent.

And Kane was _not_.

And if he could hear Kane and not see him he wouldn’t have to battle with the memories of Cage whiting out everything else. Kane in their temporarily shared room wasn’t a problem. It was too far out of the realm of context for him to ever think of Cage.

But Kane in a medical ward?

He couldn’t stand to look at him.

“Bellamy, you’re turning white,” Kane said, and Bellamy could hear the worry in his voice. “Bell…I need you to look at me. Do you want me to go?”

He felt his heart seize and he forgot to breathe for a moment as he scrabbled for response, his hands shaking bad enough he knew the signs didn’t look right. He formed a fist with his right hand, thumb extended and drew it away from his chin, before clenching his hands together in fists and moving them away from him, fingers splaying out as he did so.

 _Don’t leave_.

He could hear Kane run his hand through his hair again, something the older man did whenever he was at a loss. “I’m not helping things. You look like you’re about to be sick. I don’t…I don’t know what to do for you, kiddo. You have to give me a hint, or…” he trailed off, unable to provide a suitable ultimatum.

Bellamy moved his hands again, this time with hands clenched as he pointed his index fingers up, moving them back and forth between him and the former chancellor.

“Talk to you?” Kane echoed out loud. “About what?”

He clenched his hand again and was grateful so many signs required closed fists – he didn’t want to show Kane just how bad the shaking was. He held his clenched hand close to his chest before circling it down, opening up his left hand and making his right skip sideways like a skimming stone.

 _Anything_.

Kane sighed, sounding tired and resigned but still unsure of what Bellamy was asking. “Anything, huh? All right. But only if you can answer a couple things. Deal?”

Bellamy offered a quick nod.

Anything to not be left alone.

Or left behind.

“Is it me you’re afraid of?”

Before he could think about it, Bellamy turned his face back towards Kane. The older man looked exhausted, but more than that…he looked _worried_. More than just worry about him, but as if he was afraid of what Bellamy would say.

Bellamy shook his head. No. He wasn’t afraid of Kane. But he lacked the words, the signs for what he needed to tell him. That it was his _voice_ he needed. Kane’s voice was one of his earliest memories – from when his mother still used to go services and brought him along. Before Octavia was born. Before… _everything_. Even after they stopped going to services, Kane’s voice over the loudspeaker for morning and evening announcements sometimes seemed like his only connection to his life before he learned to be afraid. Afraid someone would find his sister. Afraid for his mother. Afraid for himself if they decided he was as guilty as Aurora for the existence of a forbidden second child.

“Then why won’t you look at me?”

Bellamy hesitated, his hand half raised to answer but he stopped. What if Kane left anyway? He repeated his earlier gesture. _Don’t leave_.

“I’m not leaving,” Kane said, offering a wan smile. “I’m just…I’m trying to _understand_.”

So was Bellamy. He repeated another gesture, the sign for embarrassment because he’d never needed or wanted someone else’s presence – and he still wasn’t sure what the hell was wrong with him that even the thought of Kane leaving him here, alone and waiting for Singh – _Abby_ – was enough to make his heart rate spike and his hands shake and his vision blur.

“Stop apologizing,” Kane admonished lightly. “You don’t have anything to be sorry for. But…but you’re beginning to make me think _I_ should be apologizing to _you_ , but I don’t know what for.”

Before he could stop himself, without remembering to use his hands, he mouthed the words. _You look like him_.

As soon as he’d mouthed it, Bellamy clapped a hand over his mouth before he could say anything else. It took Kane a minute to process what he meant.

“I look like him?” he echoed, frowning in confusion. “Like who? Like…” he trailed off, his face going pale. “Like Cage? Like the bastard who did this to you? _Jesus_ –” he shoved back from Bellamy, recoiling from him in disgust.

Bellamy made a wild grab for his hand as Kane stood, but Kane yanked it away from him.

“ _Christ_ ,” Kane swore vehemently, running his hand through his hair. “I can’t – I _can’t_ …” He turned towards the door and in a blind panic, Bellamy lunged after him.

_Nononono._

()()()()()()()()()()

Kane was going to be sick.

Too many things he hadn’t even thought about suddenly clicked.

Miller’s immediate response in the woods to Bellamy’s blind panic – trying to convince him he wasn’t Cage.

Jasper’s warning in the medical ward when they were trying to examine him the first time, that Kane could stay on Bellamy’s blind side and out of sight.

How he flinched first when Kane was near.

Being in a medical ward had to be bad enough, but to sit next to someone who only served to remind him of all that he’d suffered? He wasn’t about to put Bellamy through that, not if he could help it.

He almost tripped when Bellamy all but crashed into him from behind, and he turned in time to keep them both from falling.

“What the hell – Bell, sit back down before you hurt yourself,” Kane tried reasoning, holding Bellamy back and at arm’s length. “I’ll get Octavia – or Jasp-”

Bellamy slammed his hand into the wall with a bang, and Kane fell silent.

 _Look at me_ , Bellamy signed angrily.

“I _am_ , but-” Kane’s protest was cut short when Bellamy hit the wall again out of frustration.

 _No, you’re_ **not** , he signed, his hands moving in harsh, rigid patterns he’d been talking to Abby with. _I said don’t leave. **Don’t leave**_.

“ _You_ can’t look at me,” Kane protested. “I’m not helping, I’m making it _worse_. You’re not going to hurt my feelings by telling me to go, I can get someone else –”

_I don’t **want** someone else. **Don’t leave**._

“Bellamy…” Kane said in exasperation. “Besides giving you a panic attack, what could you _possibly_ need from me?”

 _Talk to me_ , Bellamy repeated, mouthing the words as he signed. He staggered slightly as he tried to shift his weight, but caught himself before Kane could do anything.

Kane had no idea how that could possibly help. Even now, clearly angry at him, Bellamy’s gaze still slid sideways so he wasn’t looking straight at him, but over his shoulder. The kid couldn’t stand to look at him for more than a few seconds before looking away again but he seemed just as upset about the prospect of Kane leaving.

Bellamy hadn’t been one to express emotion even as a child, and as he’d grown into an adult, he’d only become less talkative, less forthcoming and expressive. But now it was like all those years of suppressing everything were coming back to haunt him and Kane could see the battle Bellamy was waging with himself as he tried to communicate without words when he didn’t even like to express himself in the first place.

 _Your voice_ , Bellamy signed. _Your voice_ … and he paused, eyes flickering back and forth as he struggled to come up with the words he wanted, and Kane waited patiently for Bellamy to explain.

 _It isn’t his_.

Kane sighed, and crossed his arms in front of him, looking down at the ground. At least he didn’t _sound_ like the monster who tortured Bellamy for weeks. He only happened to look enough like him he sent the kid into almost cardiac arrest.

Even now, Bellamy’s breathing was coming in harsh, ragged gasps as he tried not to panic, his hands shaking and he _still_ couldn’t look at him.

It didn’t matter if he didn’t sound like this bastard Cage, he apparently looked enough like him it was more of a problem than the difference in the way he spoke was a help.

“Bellamy, no –” No, what? No, he couldn’t stay? No, this wasn’t a good idea – not with Bellamy’s reaction?

He pretended not to notice the crushed look on Bellamy’s face, or how suspiciously bright his eyes were.

The kid took a shuddering breath, and with deliberate precision, repeated it again.

 _Don’t leave_.

There was a beat as Bellamy bit his lower lip, before he moved his hands again, except this time he added another sign to the end. He clenched one hand over the other, raising them both in front of him, a universal sign of begging.

_Don’t leave…please?_

Holy hell, how did Abby manage it? How did _any_ of them manage it? He felt like he was drowning, torn between knowing he was causing Bellamy distress by staying, but trying to weigh it against his damn near panic he caused with the idea of leaving. A parent would know what to do. He didn’t even do well when he was a Chancellor.

He risked a glance over his shoulder at the door because maybe, just maybe, Abby was on her way back, or Jasper would miraculously be walking by, but Bellamy didn’t see it that way. To him, it looked like Kane was about to ignore him and leave anyway.

Out of desperation, Bellamy did the last thing Kane would’ve expected from him.

As soon as Kane turned, Bellamy lunged forwards, wrapping his arms around Kane’s neck and fisting his hands in the loose material of his jacket.

Bellamy didn’t hug. In fact, Bellamy rarely initiated contact with anyone that wasn't his sister. Even when he’d first stumbled back to camp to find Clarke alive and escaped from Mount Weather, it was she who hugged him – and it took him a minute to respond, like it was a foreign concept.

He could sympathize. He wasn’t much of a touchy feely person either, and he didn’t really know what to do with his arms because in that back of his mind, he still couldn’t help but think of the dichotomy of what Bellamy saw in him.

The man who tortured him and the only adult he looked to for help.

And he still didn’t really understand that last one, and maybe that was his problem. He couldn’t understand why he, of _all_ people in Arkadia, was who Bellamy turned to.

He could feel a dampness on the side of his neck and pretended not to notice Bellamy’s disturbingly silent tears.

And that was when he heard it.

It was so faint he almost missed it, and he would’ve never heard it if Bellamy’s face hadn’t been buried in the shoulder of his jacket. He wasn’t even sure Bellamy was aware he was doing it. It wasn’t even loud enough to be considered a whisper, but the words were there, repeated over and over again.

“ _Please don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me_.”

“Ah, hell kid…” Kane sighed, and wrapped his arms around Bellamy’s shoulders in a fatherly embrace. He could feel the kid almost relax. “I told you I wouldn’t leave.”

Not now. Not ever.


	11. Chapter 11

Six Weeks Ago

 

It was hard to describe, waking without _really_ waking up. Sounds and smells that had no context other than a disturbing feeling of wrongness. A dull ache in his shoulder, the stiffness in his jaw and a hollow pain that felt like it should be worse in his joints. His brain felt sluggish and left behind, like his body was trying to warn him but his head wasn’t listening.

And just like every other time he’d woken without knowing why, just that _something_ was wrong and he needed to move, he reacted before his brain could catch up with him.

Move now.

Think later.

There was a high pitched whine he couldn’t identify and he rolled away from it.

Or at least, tried to.

He pulled up short, something pulling on his ankles, his wrists and shoulders.

The whine changed pitch, and he heard more than felt it move and there was a sudden squelch and someone cursing.

“Goddammit,” the female voice cursed, and the whine disappeared. “Hand me that there.”

“What’d you do, nick an artery?”

“Well, he moved.”

There was a beat of silence, before he heard the second voice mutter quietly, as if to himself, “Bullshit.”

“I thought you said you gave him enough for a couple of hours.”

“I _did_. He should be a coma until tomorrow,” the male voice protested.

“Well, he’s _not_.”

The sensation in his limbs was coming back, and the dull aches were beginning to feel like molten lead inside his bones even as the rest of him was freezing cold. His hands felt numb as did his feet, which made the burning sensation even worse.

Something seared white hot against his leg and any pretense of numbness evaporated. Sensation came flooding in with the adrenaline and suddenly he could feel _everything_.

His eyes snapped open, and all he could see was bright lights that made his eyes water.

“I’ll be damned,” he heard the man say, but he didn’t sound concerned or upset – he sounded _curious_. “Aren’t you something else?”

“Stop admiring it and get over here and help me hold him down, or you’re not going to have anything left _to_ admire.”

Pain wasn’t quite the word. He didn’t think there was one. It was like the rest of his body was catching up to the present but his mind was still miles behind. _Everything_ hurt, and it was like it was ramping up which in turn made everything _else_ go haywire too – his heart thudded painfully fast against his ribs and he tried to keep his breathing even and shallow. But as the dull aches became stabbing pains and he couldn’t help the small moan of pain.

Someone put both hands down on his right leg, forcing it down and pinning it to whatever surface he was lying on – he hadn’t even been aware he was moving it.

“Stop moving kid, or you’re gonna lose more than marrow,” the male voice cautioned.

If it was supposed to be reassuring, it most certainly was _not_ , and he tried to wrench his leg free of their grasp.

“Just dose him again, Cage,” the woman growled. “He’s not going to hold still for us and we’re _just_ starting to scratch the surface.”

“Fast as his recovery was, I’m not entirely sure a second dose that _would_ put him under wouldn’t also be just enough to kill him. Work faster, Doc. It doesn’t have to be pretty, just functional.”

With renewed force, a third hand pressed down just above his knee, the other two hands gripped vicelike around his ankle and his thigh to keep him from twisting away.

Something pulled at his skin, and he heard something he couldn’t identify and maybe he didn’t want to – the sudden searing heat was back, and this time he couldn’t move his leg away from it.

“ _There_ ,” the woman said, sounding exasperated and pleased at the same time. “That should hold, but we’re going to have to delay any other sites. He’s lost too much blood, and I want to keep this one.”

One set of hands released his leg, and as soon as they did, Bellamy reflexively tried to pull it back, forgetting about the hold on his ankle.

“You sure about that?” Cage asked. “Still seems pretty feisty to me.”

Someone moved into his field of vision, momentarily blocking out the bright overhead light. Someone who looked strangely familiar, even if he could only make out the outline of a shadow.

“Kane?” Bellamy rasped, uncaring about the rasp in his voice. What the hell was the former chancellor doing here? That wasn’t Abby’s voice he could hear.

“Kane?” the man echoed. “Close, kid. Cage. We haven’t been properly introduced.”

Bellamy blinked, trying to force his vision to focus on the man’s face because that was _not_ Kane’s voice. No, not Kane…that bastard from the bunk room.

And just like that, Bellamy’s memory came flooding back in full technicolor detail – all the way up to Cage trying to drag away Fox for something he called Harvest. Without thinking, he jerked his head forward and whacked the crown of his forehead against the man’s nose.

“ _Shit_ ,” the man gasped, and Bellamy had to turn his head away as blood dripped between the man’s fingers. “Goddammit kid!”

The backhand he earned was worth it though, and he didn’t bother to hide the self-satisfied smirk, even if it pulled at his already split lips.

“I told you we should’ve used the eight points,” the woman said, voice flat and disinterested.

Cage sniffed experimentally, before pulling a white towel from somewhere out of Bellamy’s line of sight, pressing it against his nose. “Yeah, well, not even the Grounders are such big fans of using their heads as a weapon. Point noted though. You can be strapped down for any further procedures.”

Bellamy couldn’t help the frown. His memory was apparently still spotty, because he wasn’t entirely sure what ‘further procedures’ meant. It was just marrow, wasn’t it?

“You know, you really are a _fascinating_ creature, Bellamy,” Cage said, snapping Bellamy out of his thoughts. “I’m sure you’ve already figured out that space cadets are superior blood sources to the Grounder savages. It’s really a modern miracle none of you developed rampant tumors or third eyes or eight limbs considering the amount of radiation your people have been exposed to for a hundred years. Or maybe you did, and those ones were jettisoned into the cosmos before they had a chance to breed. I’m betting, though, that _your_ founding fathers decided that a little radiation exposure over a long period would be beneficial in the long run.”

Cage moved away from Bellamy’s vision, but continued talking.

“Did you know your people can even survive with less oxygen than the rest of us? A whole fifteen percent less, mind you. I know that’s a large number, but for air? That’s _huge_.”

Bellamy could hear the sound of wheels over tile, and suddenly Cage was back, much, _much_ closer. Unfortunately, he was also at an angle Bellamy couldn’t easily reach him.  So much for third time’s the charm.

“ _Our_ fore fathers, on the other hand, stupidly decided that _zero_ radiation was the way to go. That’s even less exposure than people had before the nuclear fallout. They didn’t consider the fact that less than 10 generations down the line, we would be completely unable to process more radiation than a microwave oven produces.” Cage tapped his finger to his temple, scowling. “Not exactly geniuses in that department. _But_ …they did come up with some rather interesting alternative methods of medicine. There were still people on the surface – before they went savage, we used to collect them and offer them shelter in exchange for helping diversify our gene pool.”

Bellamy wasn’t entirely sure why the hell the man was telling him the brief history of the people in Mount Weather, but he didn’t want to interrupt. If anything in the years on board the Ark after his mother died, he learned that you didn’t draw unneeded attention from men in power who decided your fate.

Cage paused briefly, lowering the towel to see if his nose had stopped bleeding again. When he realized it had, he tossed the towel off to the side. “It worked for a little while, but then fewer of them wanted to stay in the Mountain. Safe as it was, I’m sure you can imagine it’s a little claustrophobic compared to the surface of an entire planet. Can’t say I blame them. After all, that’s what _we_ want. Originally, when we picked up the survivors of the drop ship explosion, we were just planning on introducing _you_ to the gene pool. Maybe a couple generations down we would _finally_ be able to walk outside.”

Cage sat back for a moment, and Bellamy could hear the sudden whine and whir of gears. The table he was strapped to slowly started to move, tilting him upright instead of flat and staring up at the ceiling lights. He blinked rapidly at the suddenly loss of light, and winced as the blood rushed from his head. He hadn’t realized he hadn’t been lying level, he’d been tilted slightly downwards.

He shook his head to clear the spots and instead nausea welled in the back of his throat. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this bad. Not even with the fever Murphy had brought back to camp.

When his vision cleared, Cage was staring at him with disturbing intensity.

“You know _we_ couldn’t diversify the gene pool, right?” Bellamy rasped, swallowing back bile.

Cage actually laughed at that, and Bellamy wasn’t sure he liked the idea that the man had a sense of humor.

“Oh, kid. My interest in you is hardly so intimate,” Cage chuckled. “You’re more of a scientific discovery. Did you know that even compared to your space station friends, you’re an anomaly?”

Bellamy frowned at that. Pretty sure he wasn’t.

Cage cocked his head to one side, curious. “Interesting. Apparently you didn’t. Really? You never noticed anything? I’m not saying you’re immune to disease or injury, but didn’t you notice a certain…resiliency that the others lacked?”

“My immune system?” Bellamy asked.

Cage nodded slightly. “Perhaps when you get sick, it takes you longer to catch something than the others. Or you bounce back faster than everyone else?”

Bellamy shook his head, even though it made black spots dance across his vision. The only time he’d been sick since getting to the Ground was the same as everyone else – and people had gotten sick later than him.

Cage frowned again. Clearly, that wasn’t the answer he was expecting. “Alright, different angle. Did you sky people ever have a blood drive?”

Bellamy didn’t immediately answer, because he wasn’t entirely sure what the man was trying to get at. Yeah, they’d have blood drives, every couple of weeks to replenish whatever was lost in a surgery, or injury. Decaying space stations weren’t exactly the safest places to be.  

Apparently, Cage could the answer was yes, because he continued on. “When they did, how often were _you_ called to donate?”

Bellamy remained silent. He’d been called every time, but that was pretty standard. He was a universal donor, according to Abby and Jackson. So was his mother. Before she died, every time there had been a blood drive, or an emergency need, they were the ones immediately called. They even called him before he was old enough to be a donor, if there was a kid involved. Beggars couldn’t be choosers, and his mom always went with him, telling him that everything was going to be fine, and what a good thing it was that Bellamy was able to help so many.

“Ah ha,” Cage mused. “I’m right, aren’t I? There _is_ something different about you, and we’re not the only ones who noticed. Your people, the space station crew, their blood has the ability to filter radiation. When transfused to us, it filters radiation on a temporary basis. _Yours_ , as it turns out, can do it _faster_. It lasts _longer_. From what we could see from surveillance, you are remarkably…hmm, how should I put it?” Cage tapped a pale finger against the scar across his lips. “Durable.”

Now it was Bellamy’s turn to laugh. “You think I’m special because I can take a beating? You should meet Murphy.”

Cage smiled, but it was a tight smirk without humor. “I’m not suggesting you’re a superhuman, I’m suggesting you’re perhaps…the next _step_. Something just a little stronger than the last generation. Now, perhaps all of you are like that, it’s just something that comes with age. You _are_ older than the others we collected, after all. At any rate, Bellamy, _you_ are uniquely suited to survival. And that’s all we want. To _survive_.”

“There’s nothing special about me,” Bellamy muttered, letting his eyes shut for a moment.  

“I’d say your pain threshold is pretty abnormal,” Cage said, and something in the way he said it made Bellamy open his eyes. “Most people were screaming by now.”

Bellamy had been purposely ignoring just how much _everything_ hurt, because that’s how he survived. He narrowly missed being blown up with the drop ship, was taken temporary prisoner by the Grounders, survived attempted assassination by one of his own friends…his entire time on the Ground seemed to blur into one long beating. Cage was a good distraction, but he was very aware of _where_ everything hurt…he just didn’t want to look.

His last name really could be Denial.

But Cage’s comment made him look down without thinking and he instantly wished he hadn’t.

He remembered what the Grounders in their cages looked like – bandages around the tops of their knees, their elbows…bruises covering most of their skin and a sunken, hollow look to them. There was little difference between them and him now – except the long, angry red gouge across the top of his thigh that looked more like a burn than an incision. That would explain the searing heat he felt earlier, but not the why…

“What the hell did you do?” Bellamy growled, yanking on the restraints.

“ _We_ did nothing. You came to a littler earlier than expected and when you moved, Dr. Tsing here accidentally nicked your femoral artery with the drill. She had to suture and cauterize the entry.”

“Isn’t bone marrow just from your hips?” Bellamy demanded. He pulled again on his wrists restraints, even if it did nothing. He wasn’t about to just lie there, staring at the damage done while he was unconscious.

Maybe that’s what bothered him the most – injuries, he was used to. Because he got them in fights, or accidents or _something_ where he _earned_ them. Knew what happened as it happened. Or maybe it was shock, or residual effects of whatever they knocked him out with or this was just another nightmare inducing episode of his life but somehow everything just seemed…distant.

Cage shrugged. “Typically, yes. But we needed more. Bone marrow can come from any of your larger bones, too – the iliac crest, and the femur to name a few. There are almost four hundred people in the complex. We would _all_ like to get to the Ground. As the President of Mount Weather, I would like to thank you for your help in realizing that dream. You see, Bellamy, I think there’s much more you can offer than just blood and bone. The question is _how much more_.”

Somehow, it hadn’t really hit Bellamy just _how bad_ his situation was until those words were uttered. Because he’d seen bad before. Born on a dying space station. Plummeting to Earth on an ancient drop ship to an irradiated and abandoned planet’s surface. Surviving attack and threat from unknown adversaries in the woods as well as his own people. Waking up inside a metal cage, only to be knocked out again and waking next strung up by his ankles as a living blood bag.

There was something familiar about the fight for survival. It was instinct. It was primal.

But the idea of being a _specimen_ had a level of cold, clinical detachment to it that made it worse. It wasn’t a fight for survival. It was _dissection_. He didn’t register as some _one,_ he was a some _thing_.

Fuck _that_.

Bellamy wrenched his arms with all his might, so unexpectedly he made Cage jump and hard enough he felt the bones in his hand shift. He remembered Cage stomping on it – and they never bandaged or set it. He yanked again, and with a grunt of pain because _ow_ \- it hurt to move all those tiny bones in ways they weren’t meant to – and his hand pulled free of the restraint.

Cage may have jumped from surprise, but he hadn’t moved any further away, and Bellamy swung his now free arm as hard as he could against Cage’s head, knocking the older man backwards off of his seat. He could hear the doctor call for help from wherever she was, but he ignored her. He fumbled with the strap on his other hand, biting his lip as he forced his fingers to move until both hands were free.

He lunged forwards, grabbing wildly at the rollaway table near him, trying to ignore the obviously recently used tools – like the aspiration needle, the several vials of bone marrow next to it, or the drill with bits of white and red still on the bit. His fingers closed around the scalpel just as someone grabbed his shoulder, trying to press him back down to the table. He slashed wildly at it, slicing a thin red line across the top of their forearm and they let go with a cry of pain.

Bellamy didn’t bother trying to undo the restraints around his ankles – he simply cut through the narrow nylon bands with the scalpel and rolling off the side of the table and narrowly avoiding the grabbing hands of a security guard. He didn’t land gracefully, and the jarring impact of hitting his knees against the floor tore and the recent sutures

Making an escape wasn’t really what he had planned – least of all in what amounted to almost less than his underwear with enough bandages around him to be a mummy. But damn it all if he was going to lay down and die for them.

There were more guards in the room – four that he could see, plus Cage and the doctor. Six against one was hardly favorable odds, especially when he had the equivalent of a box cutter and they had _guns_.

Cage was livid – his pale face bright red from anger and renewed bleeding from his likely broken nose. “Don’t kill him,” he warned, swiping angrily at his nose.

One guard looked cautiously over at Cage who gestured at Bellamy.

“I didn’t say not to hurt him,” Cage growled.

The guard turned back to Bellamy, a grin on his face as he pulled out an extendable metal baton.

“Lovejoy was a good friend of mine,” the man snarled.

Bellamy blanked momentarily on the name before he remembered the guard he and Maya killed in the Harvest chamber. Less than four hundred people…of course the guards would be friends.

“The Forty Seven are mine,” he growled, and kicked one of the nearby stools at the nearest guard, tripping him even as he tried to rush him.

The guards were smart enough not to try and take him one at a time – as soon as he turned towards the next one, stabbing the scalpel into the man’s armpit where he could vaguely remember being some fairly important nerves, the other three managed to tackle him. They still weren’t very coordinated in their attack, and Bellamy suspected they were less accustomed to fighting someone who _could_ fight back. He didn’t expect it would sway anything in his favor, but _no_ he was not going gentle into that good night.

He landed a solid kick to another guard’s solar plexus, and the man double over, vomiting and choking as he clutched at what was probably a broken xiphoid process.

 _Rage, rage against the dying of the light_.

One of them grabbed his broken hand and crushed it forcefully in his own, trying to turn Bellamy over enough to handcuff him. He grunted in pain, feeling the shifting of the bones again, but rather than fight the roll, he turned into it, using the guard’s own force to knock his partner off balance, and sending him toppling into the first one.

“This is _ridiculous_ ,” he heard Cage snarl.

And then there was a sudden, blinding pain across the entire right half of his head, centering on his temple, and he fell into a darkness so deep and black he could only think of his mother’s final resting place, and knew no more.


	12. Chapter 12

Author's Note: I am so, SO sorry about the delay. I got stuck in more ways than one on this story, and part of it was I need to be in a certain mood to write this level of whump. Or channel some certain despotic rulers. Anyway. Everyone, say thank you to The Cocky Undead and just someone somewhere. They were a HUGE help in getting this chapter out. Also, a foot and a half of snow trapping me in house helped too. 

Also: be warned. I really, really dislike Clarke. She's in the chapter, featured for the first time in the story. She is not painted in a good light. And FYI - continuity with the show versus this A/U is aaaaaaalllll over the place because I didn't want to go back and find what episodes I needed to figure out what had and hadn't happened yet. So, just so you know, the Summit has already been blown up, and Clarke let it happen, just like she did in the show. 

Enough delays! ONWARD!

* * *

 

"He _shot_ me!" Jaha protested, slamming his fist onto the table. "He tried to kill me, and if it hadn't been for Abby ignoring _your_ orders, he would've succeeded!"

Kane bit his tongue before he could say the first thing that popped into mind, which was that there was currently little he regretted more at the moment than not physically stopping Abby from ignoring those orders and the rules of the Ark.

"You already pardoned him for those crimes," Kane reminded, for what was the millionth time. " _Weeks_ before we even got down here. And even if you hadn't, you didn't die. Abby saved your life. The least you can do is pay it forward."

"I pay it forward to those who _deserve_ it," Jaha snapped back. "Bellamy Blake hasn't done anything to deserve forgiveness. Hell, the only reason why I pardoned him in the first place was so he would give me the name of the person who put the kill order out in the first place. He didn't volunteer the info, he had to be bribed."

"Then you should have just as much of an issue with Clarke has you do Bellamy," Kane said, drumming his fingers irritably against the table. "She's the one who came up with the idea to pardon Bellamy for the name."

"She's more than pulled her own weight around since getting here," Jaha retorted. "She brokered peace with the Grounders. Hell, except for Lincoln, we haven't seen a single one of them since she came back from the Mountain."

"Yeah, but does anybody know what she did to assure that treaty?" Kane asked, glancing over to Pike who remained surprisingly quiet, watching the two former chancellors duke it out. "Anyone? She hasn't even told her mother what exactly happened. What she said, or what she promised, or why we haven't heard or seen them since. Doesn't _that_ seem a little suspicious?"

"Not half as suspicious as how Blake managed to get them free of Mount Weather, if things were as bad as you claim. If he was a prisoner, how did all 47 of them get home? That's a hell of a walk when you're healthy, and he obviously was not – and yet no one touched them. How did they get free of the base in the first place? If the people of Mount Weather were so hell bent on keeping them and siphoning off their blood and bone marrow, why would they just release them like that?"

The complete lack of empathy from his former friend sent a shiver down Kane's spine. Especially when he made it sound like the hell the kids had gone through was negligible at best.

"I don't know. And frankly, I don't really want to bring it up just yet. Jasper and Monty are finally beginning to relax again – which I didn't think was _ever_ going to happen, but Mrs. Green is pretty much a godsend when it comes to those two." Kane swiped a restless hand through his too-long hair, idly remembering he kept meaning to get it cut. "David and Nate Miller haven't been more than 20 feet from one another since Nathan got back. And I'm not about to interrogate traumatized _children_."

"Need I remind you that these _children_ are all criminals?" Jaha snapped. "Perhaps of varying degrees, but they are _all_ guilty of breaking the law. They're not children, they're _convicts_."

"For crimes that wouldn't matter here on the ground," Kane pointed out. "Jesus, Clarke was imprisoned just because she knew the Ark was failing. That's not even a crime, that's just not wanting to set off a panic on an enclosed space. Octavia was there because she _existed_. You sent your own son in the drop ship because he mangled a plant. We had to make decisions based on space and supplies and none of those things matter anymore. We're not going to suddenly run out of air. We're on a planet that once supported over seven _billion_ people, so it's not like we're going to run out of space or supplies any time soon. We may be struggling a bit to get our footing but it's a learning curve, Thelonious. We have to adapt our laws just like we're adapting our lives."

"I agree – but that's not the point I'm contesting with Blake. We may change our laws, but that does not make us _lawless_ ," Jaha said. He turned to Pike, jabbing his finger onto the table for emphasis. "I'm saying that we investigate. We find out, once and for all, what happened in that Mountain. We need to find out if the reason why they were suddenly released is something more than just a change of heart. The point is _we don't know_. They could've made a deal, they could've sold out the rest of the Arkadians for their own skins. Hell, maybe they _were_ let go because of a change of heart – maybe someone else took over Mount Weather and had them released. But this isn't just my own personal dislike for Blake at play here, and you would recognize that if you weren't playing Daddy Dearest. This is about everyone. This is about whether or not we're safe, and if we're not, what we _need_ to do to fix that."

"I'm not trying to be his father," Kane growled. "But there's only three of us in the whole of camp who speak sign language fluently enough for Bellamy to be able to talk to, and one of them is Bellamy himself. You and Pike seem to have leadership under control and no interest in dealing with any of the kids – _period_. So yes, I spend a lot of time with them. We, as adults _and_ as leaders, have a lot of ground to cover if we ever want them to trust us again."

"What do you mean?" Pike asked, speaking up for the first time in the argument.

Kane glanced between Jaha and Pike, wondering just how little they paid attention to the camp beyond leadership issues.

"I mean, they all have issues with us. Most adults, actually, and I can't really say I blame them. The two of us," he said, gesturing between himself and Jaha. "We made several of them into orphans, even if it was for the good of the Ark at the time. Not everyone is going to be as understanding as Abby about the loss of a family member. Then there was the culling of the 320 people on the Ark - which I'll take the blame for, but that doesn't mean that everyone thinks the blame ends with me. And then they have the Grounders, who tried to kill them from day one – I mean, you've seen the scar Jasper has. Monty said he was speared on their first outing into the woods. Then they attacked the drop ship, and then half of them were kidnapped by Mount Weather, and well...we know how well that turned out. These kids – outside of their parents – they don't trust adults. And it's not hard to see why."

"So you're saying ignore the fact that there could be an imminent attack on the camp," Jaha said. "Just let them, what, be kids? We can't afford that. We _need_ intel on what happened. We need to know how and why they got away from Mount Weather. We know that the Grounders are capable of biological warfare – why wouldn't the more scientifically advanced people of the Mountain do the same?"

"Abby has been over all of them with as fine a toothed comb as you can get with what we have available to us," Pike pointed out. "So far, she's found nothing."

"No, she's examined them to the point that they _let_ her," Jaha said. "There's a difference. Hell, last I checked, none of you even knew why Blake couldn't talk. Medical? Psychological? Permanent? Temporary? You don't know."

Kane was surprised when his jaw didn't literally hit the floor when it dropped in shock. "Are you _serious_? You want us to what, hold them down while we give them a more 'thorough' exam? What did I _just_ get through telling you?"

"I'm saying that the needs of the many, _Marcus_ , outweigh the wants of a few. They shouldn't worry if there's nothing wrong with them. If they have nothing to hide, then they shouldn't care. And they should be happy that we're thinking about their welfare – what if we _do_ find some sort of contagion? Do you think they'd be happier if we just let them spread it to their few remaining loved ones?"

"How are you the only actual parent at this table and still not understand how fucking nuts all of that sounds?" Kane said.

Pike held up his hand to stop Jaha from responding with his own verbal attack. "Marcus, he has a point. A bad plan to implement it, but a valid point nonetheless. We don't know what happened. I'm not even sure _they_ know what happened. But you've been around them more than the rest of us. Is there anyone that we _would_ be able to talk to? One of the ones that maybe has adjusted better? What about Nathan Miller? His dad is rock steady – and we could even have him keep Nathan company while we're talking."

"I'll give you a week's rations if you can convince David to let you do that," Kane grumbled, folding his arms across his chest as he leaned back into his chair.

Pike sighed, not necessarily in frustration, but it was certainly building towards it. "Look, we need to be prepared. If it's bio warfare, and we can catch it now, then there's no issues. If there's nothing at all, then there's no issues. But hard fact of life on the Ground is that it is better to be safe than sorry. Surely by now those kids understand that."

"You want to talk to someone who can tell you what went on there?" Kane asked. "Start with Clarke. Ask her why she hasn't been around the 47. If anyone is acting like they have something to hide, it's her – she's the one you want to talk to."

($($($($($($($(

Bellamy made the gesture again, this time much slower, and more enunciated, mouthing the word along with the sign.

Murphy stared at him blankly before shaking his head. "We _really_ need to get you a notepad. And a pencil. Or maybe just some loose dirt and a stick."

Bellamy rolled his eyes, abandoning the idea that he was going to get Murphy to concentrate anymore on sign language lessons. Instead, he held up his hand, showing Murphy the residual twitching that persisted.

"So it would be a little messy," Murphy said, throwing up his arms. "You think it's going to be any more difficult to figure out than the Hand Jive conversation we're having?"

Bellamy fixed his friend with a glare, then slowly and deliberately moved his hands in signals he _knew_ Murphy understood.

"Don't…be…such…a…dick," Murphy said out loud as he followed Bellamy's hands. He shrugged. "Can't help it. Well, I can help it, but that's not how I roll. This is officially more effort I've put into anything since crashing into the ground, so let's just take this as the minor victory it is, shall we?"

Bellamy tapped his wrist with one finger.

"How the hell would I know?" Murphy grumbled, before looking up at the sun as he shaded his eyes. "It's somewhere between…morning and night. Kane's been gone for…an inch and a half of movement."

Bellamy let his head drop into his palm with a defeated sigh, and Murphy dropped down next to him.

"Don't feel too bad, Bell. There was bound to be something you suck at," Murphy said, offering one clap on Bellamy's back. "Better men then you have tried to make me care."

The rolling clang of the gate opening had Bellamy swinging around and pushing back away from the noise before he even realized what he was doing.

Murphy didn't even look at him, which Bellamy was grateful for because it meant he missed the flush of embarrassment over freaking out over a gate swinging open.

"It's the noon patrol," Murphy said, not taking his eyes off the open gate as several Arkadians made their way in. Two of them carried a deer between them, legs trussed up and tied to a pole they lifted on their shoulders. "And they have dinner, apparently. Thank God it's not one of those two faced ones."

Bellamy mentally counted the number returning compared to the ones that went out and breathed a sigh of relief when the last Arkadian stepped through the gate.

"You count too, huh?" Murphy said, without looking back. "Glad it's not just me."

There were actually a _lot_ of things that suddenly Bellamy and Murphy seemed to share. Strange little tics that no one else paid any mind to, but Bellamy was slowly starting to tally in his head.

They were both up at odd hours – not just late at night, but freakishly early in the morning. They both did their best to avoid crowds or even minor gatherings of people. They both picked their current vantage spot because they could keep an eye on most of the camp at once – especially who came and went – without having to get up. Neither one seemed to be able to turn away from the open gate until it was closed again.

Bellamy wondered if Kane left Murphy with him more and more often on purpose, knowing that the two of them were otherwise adrift within in the camp with no one else to turn to. They'd been friends once before, and both seemed perfectly willing to let bygones be bygones.

More importantly, they were in no rush to leave the camp. Between Murphy's exile and capture by Grounders and his failed expedition with Jaha, he had even less reason to leave the camp than Bellamy.

"You two ever going to find a different spot?"

Both turned towards the voice, and Bellamy gave a half wave to Jasper and Monty as they approached.

Bellamy ran a reflexive appraising eye over both of them, even though he knew Mrs. Green was dangerously close to smothering the two of the with affection. Jasper was still rail thin, but he'd always been like that, as far as Bellamy could remember. What he cared about was that there weren't any dark shadows under his eyes, and he was actually smiling.

Monty was better too – he didn't remember a whole lot of the others in the Mountain, but Bellamy remembered enough to know that without Monty _or_ Jasper, he likely wouldn't be sitting here today. Monty had lost the nervous tic he'd developed – rapid blinking and a subtle twitch of his head – and he looked like he'd gained back the weight he'd lost.

The most reassuring sign that they were slowly starting to get back their old selves however, was the fact that both of them were stained with grease from fingertip to elbow, and Monty had smudges of…something black and gritty looking…circling his eyes where his goggles had obviously been sitting.

Bellamy clenched his hands together, right over left, twisting them back and forth while gently bouncing them off of each other with each twist.

"He's planning to wring someone's neck," Murphy supplied unhelpfully.

Bellamy shot him a glare, but Jasper grinned.

"What am I making? No idea. But I got bored, and Raven and Wick gave us a bunch of spare parts to mess around with."

"We're making a wind turbine," Monty said. "At least, part of one. We figure eventually we're going to need power that isn't run off of old batteries. We _were_ going to work on hydro power, but…" Monty trailed off, glancing at the gate.

They didn't need to elaborate. Hydro power meant the river, and the river meant leaving the camp. Monty seemed to have less of an issue with it, but Jasper was another one who had far more bad memories than good outside the fence.

Bellamy placed his thumb against the upper part of his ribcage, waggling his fingers as he did so.

"He's thinking about taking up the trumpet," Murphy translated.

"He's saying _great_ , Murph," Jasper corrected.

"In my defense, the signs kind of look alike," Murphy said, smirking.

Bellamy formed a V with two fingers, facing them out and tapped the back of his hand against his head.

Murphy stared at him blankly for a moment before turning back to Jasper. "Yeah, I got nothing on that one."

Jasper smirked back. "He called you an idiot."

Murphy turned to glare at the older boy who batted his eyes innocently.

"Really buddy? You gonna do me like that? See if I translate anymore for you," Murphy said. He folded his arms across his chest and stuck out his tongue.

Bellamy shook his head. It was the sixth time that day Murphy had sworn off translating duties, which seemed to be his default any time he was sick of Bellamy trying to tutor him. He didn't really _need_ Murphy to translate, he'd figured out how to get most ideas across to people (mostly because people only asked yes or no questions) but he kept trying to convince the younger boy that it was nice to be able to talk in 'code'.

He ignored Murphy for the moment. Instead, he turned back to Jasper and Monty. He put his hands palm open towards his chest, middle fingers touching his shirt before drawing them up and out away from him. _What's up?_

"Have you seen Kane anywhere?" Jasper asked, glancing around as if the man might appear at the mention of his name. "We need to get permission to take a couple of the old pieces of the Ark apart and Sinclair wouldn't sign off on it until we asked someone with authority."

Bellamy waved his hand towards Pike's area. The Chancellor didn't have a formal office like the chancellors of old did onboard the Ark when it was still in the sky, but he'd cordoned off a nicer part of the wreckage that became the equivalent of town offices. Jaha and Pike spent most of their time there, and it's where Kane had been dragged to more and more frequently – though when asked why or over what, Kane changed the subject.

"He's been in powwow with Señor Psycho versions One and Two for the past hour and a half," Murphy said. "Interruptions are inadvisable."

As if on cue, the door opened and the three men in question exited, but rather than break off from the trio like he normally did, Kane was setting the pace, leading the other two away towards medical.

Huh. That was odd. All three of them were walking quickly and with purpose, and even from where he sat and with his now horrible depth perception, he could see the lines of worry on Kane's face.

Something was up, and it wasn't good.

"Ah!" Jasper said triumphantly, only seeing Kane leaving, not the look on his face. "Thanks guys!"

And with that, he jogged after them, Monty trailing dutifully a step behind.

)$)$)$))$)$)$)$)$)$)$

"We need to know what you told the Grounders," Jaha demanded without preamble, crossing his arms over his chest as he glared at Clarke.

Abby shot a questioning glance over to Kane, who shook his head.

Clarke didn't look as surprised as Kane was expecting. In fact, she didn't look surprised at all. Like she'd been expecting this conversation for a while, and had mentally been steeling herself for it.

She put the medical supplies she'd been inventorying down, taking a deep breath as she wiped her hands against her sleeves.

"I brokered peace," she said, voice flat and practiced.

But Kane didn't miss the way she failed to meet anyone's gaze.

"We get that, Clarke, and we're grateful for that. But we need to know how. How did you get the Grounders to leave off?" Pike asked.

Clarke didn't immediately reply, and Kane could tell she was trying to figure out the right words to say.

"What does it have to do with Mount Weather?" Kane asked abruptly, and Clarke's head whipped towards him so fast he was surprised she didn't get whiplash.

"What?" she asked, clearly taken aback by the question.

"What do you mean, Marcus?" Abby asked, putting a gentle hand on her daughter's shoulder.

Kane shook his head. "So whatever you did, it _does_ involve Mount Weather. Don't think I haven't noticed how you can barely look at the 47. You stay as far away from them as you can get – hell, you leave the medical bay every time one of them has to come in. You purposely avoid going out on patrols and hunts with them. There's no other explanation for that kind of behavior, especially towards _them_ , other than guilt. So I ask again, Clarke – _what_ did you say to the Grounders and Mount Weather?"

Any pretense of confusion evaporated from Clarke's face as she pursed her lips together. "What I had to."

"Clarke?" Abby questioned, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh, _come on_ ," Kane snapped, finally losing his patience. "She let Mount Weather blow up the summit to keep them from finding out that we had inside intelligence. You think she draws the line there? Your daughter is a brilliant tactician, I'll give you that, but I'm only willing to accept the excuse of 'good of the many' as a defense but so many times!"

"Like with my father?" Clarke snapped back. "Or Sector 17 'population management' you enacted on the Ark?"

"So your defense is what, we all do things we regret?" Kane growled. "You still haven't given us an explanation. What did you tell the Grounders that got them to back off? What does it have to do with Mount Wea-" he stopped dead mid-sentence, horrified realization dawning.

She didn't. She _wouldn't_. Even Clarke couldn't be that cold. Not towards the Delinquents. Not towards the kids.

"I did what I had to," Clarke repeated, deflating slightly. "And I couldn't think of anything else that would keep the Grounders from attacking us, keep Mount Weather from attacking them, and keep the Grounders from attacking Mount Weather."

From the thinly pressed line of his lips, Pike clearly understood what Kane realized, but Jaha still seemed to be floundering.

"What's she talking about?" he demanded, looking from Kane to Pike and back to Clarke. "What'd she do? Are we safe?"

"As long as you don't need her to negotiate for you, sure," Kane said scathingly. "Want to say it out loud? Or should I?"

Clarke looked away, and Kane took that as a refusal.

"She bargained the 47 for us," Kane explained. "She traded those kids to Mount Weather in exchange for…what? Did they have some of Lexa's people there? Were they the ones they were using before they got their hands on superior _specimens_?"

Abby put a hand to her mouth as she stepped away from her daughter in horror.

"Mom…" Clarke protested weakly, reaching for her even as she stepped away. "You don't understand! You think I _wanted_ to trade for anyone's life? You think that was my plan all along? No! But then I kept watching people die. People being murdered. We were outmatched, and we were outgunned. If I couldn't broker a treaty with the Grounders then they were going to keep coming after us, and if I couldn't negotiate at least _something_ with Mount Weather, then so were they! So yeah – yeah, I made the hard call. I got Wallace to release the Grounders in exchange for keeping our people because then Lexa would owe us – and she would _owe_ us. She's the Commander – what she says is law. When I made the deal to have her people released, it was _only_ on the grounds that she kept every other tribe away from us. That they would leave us in peace."

"And the kids?" Pike asked.

Clarke huffed angrily, running a hand through her long blond tresses. "Wallace…Wallace said he only wanted them long enough to put all of the Mount Weather citizens through radiation therapy. Blood donating, bone marrow harvesting – neither of those are fatal. Both of them replenish, given enough time. And…and he promised that if he could get what he needed from them, he wouldn't come after the rest of the Arkadians."

Clarke looked desperately between the adults. "It wasn't a _choice_ , Mom, it was…a lack of options. I didn't know…I didn't know what they were going to do. When I was there, I was the only one interested in leaving. Jasper, Monty, Fox, Miller…all of them thought it was great. And I figured at least there they would be as safe as they could be on the ground, because they were needed alive." Her eyes looked suspiciously bright. "I'm sorry – I'm not a commander. I'm not a chancellor. I did what I could to make sure no one else was going to die and…and I'm _sorry_ mom."

Anything that Abby might've said was cut off with an angry shout and a blur of movement that was so fast Kane didn't even register what he saw.

Jasper came from seemingly out of nowhere, hurtling past Jaha and Pike and full on tackling Clarke to the ground, hitting her so hard that the two of them smashed into the ground.

"You _bitch_!" Jasper roared, and swung violently at Clarke's head.

"Jasper, stop!" Abby ordered, but Kane would've been surprised if Jasper even heard her.

Clarke managed to block Jasper's wild right hook, swinging her left leg up and over Jasper's side to twist the two of them on the ground so Jasper was the one on the ground instead of her. She didn't manage to stop Jasper's head though, and he cracked the crown of his forehead against her face.

"Jordan!" Jaha tried, but both kids ignored him.

Abby and Kane tried pulling Clarke off of Jasper, but Jasper wasn't about to let go so easily.

He wrapped his fingers in Clarke's loose hair, yanking violently, pulling her off to one side as they rolled again, this time straight out of the medical bay and into the open air.

"You sold us out to save the goddamned _Grounders_?!" Jasper shouted.

Clarke landed a solid blow to Jasper's already bruised head, but while it managed to stun him slightly, it wasn't enough for her to get free of him for long. She staggered upright, but didn't even manage a step before Jasper was launching himself around her waist again, knocking her back into the dirt.

"You _left us behind_!" Jasper roared, and raised his hand to hit her again but strong arms wrapped themselves around his and yanked him up.

He was dimly aware that it was Pike's guards, one of them even Nathan's dad, but he didn't care. All he heard was blood pounding in his ears as his vision washed in murderous red.

"You _left us behind_!" Jasper shouted, twisting in the guards' grip.

He was going to kill her.

Something hard smashed into the back of his head and suddenly nothing wanted to work anymore. He felt himself go limp and distantly realized he could hear shouting – shouting all around him – from Kane and Abby and Pike and Monty – even as the entire world dipped out of focus. None of his limbs would respond to him, and he felt like a ragdoll in the grips of the guards.

And then, just as suddenly, he was face down in the dirt again. The grip on his arms were gone and the shouting seemed louder.

He could see well enough – just everything and everyone had a twin, and he closed one eye to try and figure out which one was real.

As soon as he realized what had happened though, both eyes flew open as he tried to force himself upright once more.

"Bellamy, _stop_!" he yelled. Or, at least, he _tried_. It came out slurred and jumbled and sound more like 'ell-mee, op' but he didn't care.

Bellamy had tackled both guards to the ground, but unlike Jasper tackling Clarke, he could put considerably more force behind every blow and thanks to guardsmen training, Bellamy knew all the counter blocks. He slammed a fist into the guard's face, and there was blood everywhere as the cartilage fractured and tore through thin skin. Before he could land another blow though, the second guard hauled him up by the back of his jacket, yanking him to his feet.

Instead of being pulled off balance like the guard no doubted intended, Bellamy threw most of his weight into the direction he was already being pulled, colliding with twice the force the guard was expecting, knocking him backwards along with him so that the guard had to brace one foot behind him to keep from falling back with Bellamy on top of him.

Bellamy took advantage of the guards' utter disbelief, and wrenched his arms free, reaching up and over his shoulders to grab the guard's head. In a move that Jasper would never believe except he saw it, Bellamy kicked his feet up, almost to the height of his shoulder, and then swung them violently downwards, his own legs going between the space between the guard's and throwing the man forwards in a shoulder throw as he fell.

"Holy shit…" Jasper heard from someone above him. He couldn't tell if it was another guard or someone in the crowd, but he whole heartedly agreed.

Bellamy was a goddamn _badass_ – and for a moment, Jasper thought that was all they needed to get out of this mess.

But the universe hated them.

And they were sorely outnumbered.

Maybe if it wasn't just Kane and Monty standing up to Pike and Jaha who were yelling for the guards to take Bellamy out, it would've made a difference, but there weren't. And more people were afraid of Pike than they were of Kane…though, watching a clearly enraged Bellamy taking out full grown, fully trained adults, that might be changing.

"Give me that," Jaha snarled, and wrenched one of the stun batons away from the nearest guard.

Kane reached to grab it from him, but Jaha instead turned it on the former chancellor, driving the baton into the other man's stomach as he hit the stun button on it.

Kane dropped like a stone, with a noise not quite a shout and not quite a groan, twitching slightly as he hit the ground.

"Bell!" Monty shouted in warning, just in time for Bellamy to turn…the wrong direction, _away_ from Jaha so that it was his blind eye facing the half-mad councilman.

He never even saw the baton swinging towards him as it collided with the side of his head, an arc of blue electricity crackling as it hit.

Bellamy fell backwards without a sound, landing almost on top of Kane.

Jasper could smell the blood before he could see it, pooling around Bellamy's head in a crimson halo in the dirt and for a moment he thought Jaha had killed him.

So did Kane, because the man immediately put a still twitching hand out to Bellamy's neck, feeling for a pulse and almost sobbed in relief when he felt it.

He said something to Jaha, and the man sneered, jabbing the end of the baton into Kane's side even as Abby and Monty shouted in protest.

Somewhere above him, he heard an unfamiliar voice.

"Nighty night, kid."

This time, he fell into oblivion, the echoes of his friend's voice falling after him.

* * *

 

Author's note: Ta daaaaa! A little bit of Jasper, a little bit of Kane, a little bit of Bellamy. Some action, some plot development....also, second longest chapter at almost 6000 words. Wow. That's pretty impressive. I did say I was going to update this before the new year and AHAHAHAHAHHA! LOOK AT WHAT I DID! FOLLOWED THROUGH!

Also, back to some things in the story: I think most of you who read this aren't a fan of Clarke (Lily Candy. Tranquil Tears. Feathered Filly. Looking at you.) so I don't feel too bad about making her into a villain-esque type character who puts needs of the many ahead the wants of a few (which is why I mentioned the summit that she let blow up so that Mount Weather wouldn't know they knew about it). 

Anywho - again, so sorry about the delay, I haven't forgotten or abandoned it. Let me know what you think? Worth the wait? Can't believe how bad it is? Drop me a line!  
  
AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!


	13. Chapter 13

Author's Note: This is going to be quick because I'm late for a fundraiser so: SO SORRY ABOUT THE DELAY. I think I wrote this chapter like 9 times before I wrote this version, and instead of taking HOURS to write I think it took 45 minutes, so I'm assuming this is the one to post. Well, it's getting posted, anyway. Secondly, I decided not to do an immediate follow on scene to the last one because it just wasn't working out. And, third, apologies that this is half the length of the last chapter, but I did try to work in suggestions from you guys! So, let me know what you think!

* * *

 

"I said _tie him_!"

"And I said, _don't you dare_."

The clatter of metal on metal sent a spike of white hot agony through Jasper's head, and he groaned aloud. It took him several seconds to work up the motor coordination to move his hand enough to reach for his head. It took several more to actually move it where he wanted to without slapping himself in the face.

The entire side of his head hurt, and one eye was swollen bad enough he couldn't open it no matter how hard he tried. Probing fingers that weren't his own made him hiss in pain, and suddenly the bright light that had been hanging over him was gone.

"Sorry, Jasper," Jackson said, and Jasper could hear the grimace in the man's voice, even if he couldn't see him. "I didn't realize you were awake."

"Neither did I," Jasper rasped, wincing at the sound of his own voice. Oh, it even hurt to _talk_ … "Kinda wish I wasn't."

Jackson made a non-committal noise in the back of his throat before answering. "Kinda wish _he_ wasn't either."

"Abby, _move_. I'm not asking again."

"Good. Then it will save me time telling you no again."

Jasper managed to turn his head, which made his vision swim drunkenly and he swallowed back the urge to vomit and he tried to piece together what the hell he was looking at.

Jaha and Pike were there, but they were standing back, stopped in part by Miller's dad, and partly by Abby. But what Jasper suspected was likely the more dominant reason was they couldn't _get_ any closer to Kane and Bellamy. Not without having their legs taken out from underneath them.

Bellamy kicked again, swinging his leg with a wide arc against the leg of the exam table with another bang, but Abby was fast enough she managed to grab the tray of medical supplies before it toppled off the other side.

"Marcus –" Abby warned.

"I'm fucking _trying_ ," Kane snarled.

It took a moment for Jasper to really process what he was looking at, and he blamed what was obviously a concussion and only one marginally functional eye, because for one ridiculous minute, he couldn't distinguish what was Kane and what was Bellamy.

Bellamy had obviously come to faster than Jasper had, which, honestly, was pretty surprising considering how hard it looked like he got hit by Jaha. But then, he'd only been hit once, and Jasper had honestly lost track of how many times he'd been hit.

Kane was on the floor with Bellamy, pushed so far into the corner that Jasper hadn't seen him at first because he was actually _behind_ Bellamy, and was trying his damnedest to keep Bellamy from lashing out at him or cause further damage to himself. He had one leg pinning Bellamy's bad one down, but his other one was bent, propping up Bellamy's back as he was twisted towards Kane's chest, pinning one of his own arms beneath his weight.

But for some strange reason, Kane was only using one arm to restrain Bellamy, and it was wrapped around Bellamy's chest, trying to pin his other arm down. It would've been a lot easier if Kane would use his other hand to bear hug Bellamy to prevent him from the panicked thrashing that was keeping Abby at bay.

Jasper opened his mouth, about to point such an obvious piece of advice that he'd learned over six hellish weeks in Mount Weather, when he finally saw _why_ Kane wasn't using his other hand to restrain him.

His hand was pressed against the side of Bellamy's head, covered in a bright sheen of red as even more blood bubbled up and over and through his clenched fingers as Kane literally tried to hold his skin together. A swathe of crimson already covered half of Bellamy's face, while fresh blood slicked Kane's fingers, running in rivulets from over his hand to trickling down his wrist to soak the cuff of his long-sleeved shirt.

It suddenly occurred to Jasper that Bellamy wasn't thrashing because he was panicking – well, scratch that, he _was_ – but not because of the close proximity of Abby and Jaha, or even being in medical.

It was from _pain_.

"Thelonious, Charles, I am going to give you both _one_ more warning – get _out_ of my medical bay, or I will do something that violates my Hippocratic Oath. He's obviously not going anywhere, and the two of you aren't helping."

"Abby – " Jaha started, but Abby grabbed a loaded hypodermic from the tray and held it up within an inch of Jaha's nose.

" _Violates_ ," Abby emphatically, and Jasper had to wonder just where she intended on sticking that needle if Jaha didn't comply.

Finally, Pike reached for the man's arm, steering him towards the exit.

"We'll go. But I'm posting guards outside. This isn't over, Abby. Marcus," Pike warned, nodding his head towards the other two adults. With that vague warning, he disappeared through the door, practically dragging Jaha outside with him.

"Asshole," Abby muttered under her breath, giving one last scathing look towards the closed door before she dropped the hypodermic back on the tray.

She crouched down, holding one hand out to Bellamy's leg, cautiously reaching her fingers out until they barely touched his leg.

The reaction was instantaneous, and she jumped back in just enough time to avoid Bellamy's kick. The force behind it was enough to rock both him and Kane backwards, the older man hitting against the wall. His hand on Bellamy's head slipped, and a new well of bright red blood poured over his fingers.

Jasper swallowed back another round of bile. At this point in his life, he was used to blood and injuries. Hell, he's been _harpooned_. But his own concussion was making everything worse – the sight, the sound, the _smell_ …

But nothing was quite as stomach turning as seeing the flap of skin against Bellamy's skull flap like a piece of loose fabric the second Kane moved his hand.

"When Jaha hit him, he hit him hard enough to split the skin," Jackson said quietly, one hand resting on Jasper's arm. Jasper suspected it had more to do with the medic's comfort than his own, but he didn't protest. "He was out, but not long enough. When Abby was trying to see if he'd fractured his skull, he came awake fighting."

It was then that Jasper noted the blood that was pretty much _everywhere_. Spattered against the counter, across the supply case, even on the floor. He hadn't even noticed the dried and crusted rusty red stains on Abby's hands, or across her shirt.

He could just imagine the fight that took place, and he was selfishly glad he missed it.

This was hitting too close to home. This was too close to the Mountain.

And if _he_ was having trouble keeping his memories separate from reality, then he had no doubt it was worse for Bellamy.

"Just knock him out," Jasper whispered, hating himself for even suggesting it. But he knew Bellamy was nowhere near close to passing out from blood loss _or_ exhaustion, and unlike Mount Weather, they didn't have the hospital staff or capability to replenish what Bellamy was losing.

At least the monsters in the Mountain could repair the physical damage they inflicted. Even if sometimes they didn't want to.

"We _tried_ ," Jackson whispered, and his hand on Jasper's arm clenched. "That's with four doses. After that, Abby stopped trying because we need to ration."

Jasper could hear Bellamy's panicked breathing, the great shuddering breaths that shook his whole frame, sounding more like wheezing and he knew from experience Bellamy was trying frantically not to pass out. Bellamy would rather endure agony than let go of an already tenuous grasp on reality, which meant that if they couldn't knock him out with anesthetic, then they had to at least convince him to hold still.

Jasper squeezed his eyes shut, ignoring the pooling of saline in the corners.

"Jackson, go find one of the kids…" he whispered.

Jackson didn't speak for a moment, before he hesitantly asked, "One of the 100?"

Jasper shook his head. "One of the younger kids. Ten or younger."

"Why?"

Jasper wanted to bite his tongue, to pretend like he'd said nothing at all and maybe Jackson would let him.

But then he heard Kane, whispering frantically to Bellamy that everything was okay, and I know it hurts, and _please_ let us help you, voice cracking on the last word.

"You'll see," Jasper said.

Jackson didn't question him again, and the comforting hand on his arm was suddenly gone. He heard the door open and close, and as soon as he knew Jackson was gone, he drew his legs up to almost his chest, curling in on himself as he covered his still aching head with his arms, trying to block out the world around him.

Why did it always have to be him that stabbed Bellamy in the back?

* * *

 

 _Everything hurt_.

He'd learned to keep his eyes shut, both of them, because the little he could see was overwhelming.

It was dark.

It was blinding white.

It was loud.

It was silent as the vacuum of space.

Something hot and sticky dripped in his bad eye, pooling in the corner like tears until it dripped down his cheek, but he wasn't crying.

Yes, he was.

No, he wasn't.

He didn't even know anymore.

Instead of unnervingly numb, as if his body was not his own, he felt _everything_. The rough fabric against his hand as he clutched mindlessly at whatever was restraining it, the warmth of arm around him, the freezing cold air that made his teeth chatter and his hands and feet feel like ice and the unforgiving pressure against the side of his head that almost whited out everything else.

He tried to escape it, but the pressure followed him wherever he moved, keeping that lance of agony spearing through every other thought.

He could hear Singh in the background, yelling at someone but he couldn't imagine who – no one questioned her authority in the operating theater.

But that didn't make sense either.

He was on the floor.

No, he wasn't, he was held down with hands and straps as someone twisted his face away from scalpel blade that scraped against fractured bones.

He was being punished for not telling them about his vision.

They were the ones that stole it.

They were trying to fix it.

 _They were lying_.

And the omnipresent voice in his ear, whispering that he was safe, that they were only trying to help and _please let them_ seemed so horribly out of place and comfortingly familiar and so _wrong_ inside the Mountain.

The pressure increased on the side of his head and he arced away from it, biting down on his lip to keep from screaming as he pushed away from it, trying to hit _anything_ he could to find purchase. To find a foothold. To _get away._

 _Go away. Go_ _ **away**_ **.** _Go away, goaway, goawaygoawayawayaway let_ _ **GO**_.

Instead, arms held tighter, hands pinned his legs, and held him down.

He couldn't breathe. He was choking. He was _drowning_. _He was dying_.

As soon as he opened his mouth to breathe, all he could taste was copper and iron and salt and antiseptic and air that was _too_ clean, and _too_ recycled and hardly air at all.

The voice seemed to know he was dying too, because suddenly it tapered off, cracking on the last word, and lips pressed against his temple, just like his mother did to him before they dragged her away.

He violently twisted his head away, feeling the pressure give as the hand slipped and spots flashed across his darkened vision. He would rather be trapped in a world of pain than _that_ memory of his mother.

The voice was back, and so was the agony against his head, but this time the words made less sense. It was trying to apologize.

He heard a door, heard shouting, and the door shut again.

The voice didn't speak to him, but he could hear it all the same.

"What the hell is she doing in here?"

"Jasper said-"

" _Bellamy_ , open your eyes."

 _That_ voice overrode the others, and Bellamy blinked his eyes open, ignoring the stinging from the bad one as he tried to blink away whatever ran in it.

And he froze.

* * *

 

Kane was about to yell at Jackson, because what the hell was the younger man thinking, bringing in a kid like that?

The girl was probably no older than seven, wide dark eyes solemn as she clutched onto Jackson's hand. Long, almost black hair was tied in a braid that fell over one shoulder, and Kane guessed she was one of the Farm Station survivors, which would explain why she remained silent even after seeing Bellamy.

It was probably not the worst thing she'd seen.

Jasper suddenly spoke from his position on the other exam table, and Kane was surprised he was even conscious. But then, he'd literally had his hands full with trying to keep Bellamy from further injuring himself, and hadn't even noticed Jackson leave.

" _Bellamy_ , open your eyes," Jasper ordered, not even bothering to look up. If anything, he curled even further in on himself.

And to Kane's eternal surprise, Bellamy did. It took a moment for him to blink the blood out of his eye, but as soon as he could see, he stiffened in Kane's grip before suddenly going lax and for a horrifying moment, Kane thought he'd gone into hypovolemic shock because he didn't pass out. His eyes remained opened, staring unblinkingly at the girl who hadn't spoken a word.

The reaction was so fast, like a marionette whose strings had been cut, Kane lost his grip on bone deep laceration across Bellamy's temple momentarily, and he quickly pressed down on the hanging flap of skin before Bellamy could twist away.

But Bellamy didn't move.

His hands that had been so tightly clenched around Marcus's arm, twisted in his jacket, fell, going completely limp. The leg that had so violently struck out against any advance by Abby remained motionless against the ground, he was sure he'd managed to re-injure the nerves in his struggles.

"Abby?" he prompted, unable or maybe just unwilling to search for Bellamy's pulse, to look down and see what the damage was or what had made him go abruptly lifeless.

"I don't know…" Abby said helplessly, putting her fingers to the side of Bellamy's neck and feeling for a pulse.

If it weren't for the rabbit like, quick, shallow breaths that barely moved his chest, he could've been mistaken for a corpse.

"He built up a tolerance in the second week," Jasper rasped, making all three adults turn towards him. He refused to meet their eyes, refused to even look in their direction.

He did, however, lift one hand to gesture towards the little girl that stood before them.

The one that Bellamy stared unblinkingly at.

Jasper's quiet accusation pierced Kane's heart as sure as any knife.

"How do you _think_ they got him to let them do all those things to him?"

* * *

 

So, how was it? Did it work as well as my sleep deprived brain thinks it did? It was written really quickly, but I rather like it. Part of the delay is the wholly uninspiring season 4 that just makes me angry at every other character. You'll notice Octavia has pretty much vanished, and it's because I want to throttle her, soooo....anyway, I think next chapter is going to be a flashback, and it's probably going to explain that last comment. So, read and review if you're still reading! THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HAS LEFT A REVIEW YOU'RE AMAZINg AND I AM SO LATE NOW. 


	14. Chapter 14

Author's Note: Bet you thought I was dead, didn't ya? Nope. Just terribly, TERRIBLY neglectful and SO FRIGGIN STUCK ON THIS ONE CHAPTER IT'S NOT EVEN FUNNY. The Cocky Undead saves the day and let me pester her at all hours about this godforsaken chapter that JUST DIDN'T WANT TO BE WRITTEN. On a slightly better note, I actually finally got to see the end of season 4, and it makes me happy that Bellamy and Octavia are no longer at odds, Bellamy is back to being the heart of the show and not some bizarro drone version of himself like season 3, and honestly - I kinda like Echo. Like, enough to contemplate bringing her in here as the plot device to bring Grounders into this (because no Lexa. Lexa irks me, and dealt primarily with Clarke, who is not the main focus). Echo, on the other hand, has some pretty interesting plays with Bellamy. 

Enough rambling. It's been long enough! ONWARD!

* * *

 

Bellamy didn't move.

The girl stared back at him with solemn eyes that were too young to have seen so much. She didn't even flinch at the amount of blood. She didn't look away and try to hide her face from his.

And neither did he.

It wasn't the threat of violence that kept him still. Violence would happen anyway. Tsing didn't believe in niceties like anesthesia. She did, however believe in sedation, which was worse because being asleep didn't mean things didn't hurt.

It just meant his nightmares were real.

When sedatives no longer worked – because they learned  _real_   _quick_  if he was able to move, he would and  _did_  – Tsing switched to paralytics. She wasn't  _as_  fond of those because they caused more problems than they solved. They didn't have amnestic or analgesic properties, and they didn't prevent muscles from moving when they were directly stimulated.

Bellamy's brain may not be able to send messages to muscles, but Tsing apparently could, whether it was intentional or not.

There was also the added hassle of having to make sure he was intubated if she didn't want him dead, which, according to her, was just plain inconvenient, because she had to have more people helping her to monitor and they impeded her free movement.

She liked to get lost in her work, and she didn't like people interrupting with things like 'erratic heart rate' or 'dropping blood pressure' or 'respiratory distress.'

And, like almost anything else they introduced to his system, Bellamy built up a tolerance, which meant that in order to keep him from moving, Tsing had to up the dosages to the point of organ damage. The scar near his hip was a reminder of her checking her work, to see how long she could keep up at the rate she was progressing and at the rate Bellamy was deteriorating.

With the amount of drugs she had him on – not for long. Bellamy remembered the conversation held around him as if he couldn't hear them. Even at the rate that he seemed to recover, Tsing exceeded it on a daily basis. If they needed him alive, they had two options: give him a chance to heal, for his tolerances to go down (which Tsing laughed at), or find a way to keep him still without the indiscriminate use of drugs.

Thanks to his first day on the table, Cage was reluctant to believe any amount of straps could keep him down without him still being able to move, or completely blocking whatever part of him Tsing wanted access to.

Tsing argued that self-preservation would keep him from moving when there was a blade in his skin. Then it was Cage's turn to laugh. Because for all of Tsing's knowledge of how the human body worked, she still didn't understand the mind.

Death, Cage argued, was not the worst thing to happen to someone like Bellamy.

Bellamy wasn't always returned to the 47. If Tsing was in the middle of something that needed monitoring, or if she needed a handy transfusion available because scouts were coming back, they left him in hospital ward. He was never alone there, but he was set apart from anyone else coming in, tethered to the furthest cot in the corner.

He knew this was where Clarke escaped from. His brain tried to convince him that he could, too. But everything hurt to move. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to simply  _lie still and do nothing_. Most of Tsing's incisions and drilling were near his joints, but while painful, they weren't the worst.

Today, she had started on his back.

He knew enough from the forced biology and medical classes the kids on the Ark had to take to remember that spinal taps were supposed to be lower on the back, and you weren't supposed to do more than one at a time.

Definitely not three. And  _definitely_  not all the way up to between his shoulder blades.

In his darker moments, he wished Clarke was in his place, just to see how easily she could escape if her entire body felt like it was on fire. He didn't need restraints or drugs to keep him where they put him – he may have a high tolerance for pain, but that didn't mean he was without limits. And loathe as he was to admit it, the hospital ward and its beds were a welcome respite from the cold of the surgery table, and he didn't have to worry about keeping up appearances in front of the other kids.

The  _knowledge_  of the amount of pain he would be in if he attempted to stand was more effective than the ankle restraints. He didn't even want to change positions from where he was curled on the bed – the only position that even moderately allowed the pain in his spine to subside - never mind try and escape.

Not that he didn't plan it.

Down to every. Last. Goddamn. Detail.

And every one of those details evaporated when a young girl, maybe old enough to have started preschooling classes if they were on the Ark, shuffled into view.

She looked impossibly young and out of place, her finger jammed into her cheek even though Bellamy suspected she was at least old enough not to still be sucking on thumbs. She didn't speak, simply stared at him, dark eyes curious but unafraid. That was odd by itself. Bellamy  _knew_  he looked about as well as he felt. He hadn't been outside in days, his darker skin growing paler as the weeks dragged on that had nothing to do with blood loss. He knew whatever Tsing had done today spiked a fever, even though he was still freezing cold and shivered despite his best efforts to remain as still as possible.

Not to mention the still violently shaded side of his face where Cage had struck him with  _whatever the hell it was_ , or his bruised and swollen hand that Tsing hadn't felt necessary to cast where he'd broken it further trying to get free.

"What're you doing here?" he asked, wincing at the sound of his own voice. It sounded like he'd swallowed gravel and rinsed with acid. It'd been rubbed raw by that infernal tube until it felt like it was there even when it wasn't.

The little girl didn't seem to mind though, and she held her arm out to him. Her tiny hand was encased in sterile white gauze, but he could just make out the tubing for an IV port poking out from underneath. He blinked, his right eye still blurred and essentially useless when it came to seeing anything besides vague shapes and differences between shadow and light, but his good eye drifted to her collar bone, just barely visible over the edge of her hospital gown. She had a similar port to the adults, like the one he'd seen on Maya, and on Cage where they received radiation treatments from the captured Grounders.

"I'm sick," she said, offering a quick, gap toothed smile around her finger. "Are you sick too?"

Bellamy fought the urge to cringe. Maybe not the way she meant it, but he wasn't about to clarify. "Yeah," he rasped. "Rough couple of days."

"I'm getting better," the girl said proudly, confident in whatever she'd been told by an adult.

But Bellamy could see she didn't look like the other kids he'd seen on his brief tour of the bunker, looking for  _his_  kids. The other children in the Mountain all looked healthy, if a little on the pale side from not seeing daylight.

She did not.

Besides the obvious IV and sleeve on her hand, her skin was beyond pale – it was almost translucent. Bruises mottled her skin in angry red patches on her visibly thin arms. The whites of her eyes were jaundiced yellow, and her long, dark hair was thin and brittle looking.

Something besides radiation exposure was the source of her illness.

"I bet you will, too," she said. She reached out a hand to clumsily offer a comforting pat on his shoulder. "Momma says they have new medicine." The little girl glanced around, obviously trying to be secretive in a way only little kids could. She cupped her hand to her mouth, whispering just as loudly as she spoke. "She says I get to have another birthday this year, even though I wasn't supposed to get anymore."

Bellamy couldn't help the smile back, even though it pulled painfully on bruised skin and dry lips. She looked so excited, so  _happy_ , it was hard not to share her enthusiasm.

Well, maybe not  _share_. But he'd always liked kids better than adults. If his mom hadn't been so worried about hiding Octavia, about placing him in a position of authority that might help prevent her from being discovered, he would've followed happily in her footsteps as a history teacher. And despite feeling like absolute hell, her gap toothed smile was a moderate distraction.

"Does your hand hurt?" she asked, using her free hand to point to his badly bruised one.

He shook his head and immediately regretted it. A side effect of lumbar punctures was often headaches, even if they were done well. There was little doubt that chances increased when done badly. Instead, trying to keep the grimace off his face, and smother the pained whine building in the back of his throat, he whispered back, "Not even a little."

She frowned at that, looking wistfully down at her own mottled skin. " _Mine_  does," she whispered back. "But I tell Momma it doesn't, so she doesn't feel sad." The girl risked a look back at him through long, dark lashes. "Don't tell her?"

"Never," he promised.

The little girl's easy smile was back, and now that she was smiling without half of her face obscured by her hand, he could see she was missing more than one tooth.

" _Lena!_ "

Bellamy flinched reflexively, jolting further back on the bed and hissed between clenched teeth as the movement aggravated his injuries.

Lena, on the other hand, turned to look up and offered her disarming grin to the devil himself.

"What're you doing back here, munchkin?" Cage asked, mock seriously as he gave her a stern look. "Your mother has been looking for you for at  _least_  ten minutes."

Lena gestured towards Bellamy even as she tugged on Cage's pant leg. "I made a friend, Mr. Cage!"

Cage's dark, emotionless eyes flitted to Bellamy, the warning clear as day. "I can see that. But kiddo, what did I tell you about visiting in the hospital wing?"

Lena heaved a melodramatic sigh, tiny shoulders deflating. "People here are sick, and I shouldn't bug people when they're trying to get better because they need  _rest_ ," she recited, her lower lip jutting out impossibly far.

"I'll let it slide this time," Cage said, the same not-serious serious look on his face. "But only because you're cute," he said with a smile, the scar on his lip pulling at the skin as if it were a sneer. "Now back to your mother, before she scolds me again. Say good bye to your new friend."

Lena turned to Bellamy and he expected a small, shy wave or maybe another glimpse of her smile, but instead she leaned forward until her lips touched his forehead, making an audible  _smack_  with her lips. "Feel better!"

Maybe it was Bellamy's own prejudice interpreting Cage's expression though, because Lena didn't seem at all bothered by it. Instead, she started off towards the other end of the hospital wing, not quite skipping but that funny sort of hop step all little girls seemed to have when they were young.

As soon as she was out of sight, Cage watching her unblinkingly until she was past the door and into the next set of rooms, he dropped down onto the bed opposite Bellamy. He ran a tired hand through his hair, scrubbing at his face before finally looking back at Bellamy.

"Don't think that what you are enduring is for  _fun_ ," Cage said, before pausing. "Well, not for me, anyway. I'm not sure about Lorelai. Her bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired under the best circumstances. That's at least  _one_  thing we can agree on, hmm?"

Bellamy didn't answer. He wasn't even sure he was supposed to. Cage wasn't one for idle conversation. Mostly, he was utterly disinterested in Bellamy, and seemed to mostly exist to remind her that  _yes_ , Bellamy was needed alive.

So he remained silent.

Cage pressed on. "Little Lena Sparrow. She's pretty adorable, right?"

Bellamy said nothing.

For a moment, the two of them stared at each other, silently assessing the other.

"You want to know  _why_  you're here?" Cage finally asked, tone conversational. He pointed back towards the door. "You're here because of  _her_. Because of other  _kids_  like her. I meant what I told you that first day. Your people grew stronger. Ours grew weaker. Kids like Lena?  _That_  is  _our_  legacy. No immune system. Unable to stand in the sun.  _Unable to breathe the air_. Even with our advanced air scrubbers, we can't get guarantee we get  _all_  of the particles of radiation. Or germs. And if something  _does_  get through? The next generation,  _her_  generation? They won't be able to fight it. Not even with the treatments from the other Grounders. Not even with the treatment from the 47. Until you came here, willingly or not, these kids were our  _last_  kids."

Cage paused, and Bellamy could see the grip he had on the edge of his bed tighten.

"Until  _you_ , Bellamy…Lena was terminal. There was cure, there was no  _treatment_. But you...you're not just something for harvest."

Bellamy couldn't help the derisive snort at that.

Cage offered a one shouldered shrug. "Not  _just_  harvest," he emphasized. "And I think even your own people knew that. They may not have  _needed_  you the way we do. But you are somebody's design. I readily admit that I am a monster. I have done  _monstrous_  things. I am a monster  _maker_. I don't… _care_  for people. Not the way that you do. Not the way that my father does. What  _I_  care about are results. I want  _my people_  to live. I want there to be more to the human race than a bunch of filthy, quibbling savages who in less than a hundred years forgot their own language. Who legitimately believe that Tondc was the name of a city, with no memory of  _Washington D.C_. I have no quarrel with the Sky People. I would actually like there to be a truce between us, someday. But for that to happen, Bellamy, my people need to be able to walk under the sun without a radiation suit."

"You could've  _asked_ ," Bellamy interrupted.

Cage stared at him, mouth open to continue his justifiable psychopath monologue. Then his mouth clicked shut, and he frowned, cocking his head to one side. "Ask?"

Bellamy took a breath and held it, steeling himself for how much this was going to hurt and pushed himself upright with his good hand.

His spine  _ignited_  – white and fiery hot that blanked out his vision momentarily as his head pounded in rhythm with his heart and he couldn't help the pained gasp as he doubled over on himself.

But he didn't pass out, and he didn't scream. And he stayed upright. Not quite able to look Cage in the eye, but certainly better than lying in the fetal position on the bed in front of him.

"Yeah.  _Ask_ ," he repeated. "There's more than just the 47. There's more than just  _us_. There's  _hundreds_  of us. Why wouldn't you think to ask us if we could help? That we wouldn't  _want_  to help? You're just…" he struggled for the words. "You're the Ark underground."

Cage's shark like eyes flickered for a moment, an emotion so fast Bellamy couldn't place it before it was gone. And then he laughed.

Scoffed, really. As if what Bellamy suggested was the stupidest thing he'd ever heard.

"You think we  _didn't_?" he snarled. "We had no intention of harvesting  _any_  of you. We picked your people out of the explosion with no intention of doing  _anything_  else besides integrating them to our population. We weren't looking for a magic cure. We just wanted to survive another generation. To buy ourselves  _time_  to come up with treatment for our radiation intolerance. But that little bitch  _Clarke_  couldn't leave well enough alone. She couldn't accept life here in the Mountain, and worse, she couldn't let anyone  _else_  accept it either. And with her stunt with trying to open the door? With her disregard for  _any_  life here in Mount Weather? I would've had her executed on the spot if I didn't think it would cause a revolt. Your friend, Jasper? He volunteered to help too, but his friend wouldn't let him more than once, even  _after_  seeing the results because  _Clarke wouldn't like it_. Why the  _hell_  would we think you would be any better, any different? We couldn't take that risk. We needed to  _live_  more than we needed to be friends."

"She saw what you were doing," Bellamy bit out. Oh, sitting up was a terrible idea. Such a terrible idea. He was almost glad he hadn't eaten anything recently, because he didn't want to imagine how much throwing up would hurt right now. "What you were using the Grounders for."

Now Cage really  _did_  chuckle. "Yeah. Sure. Suddenly you guys care about the same people who have been trying to kill you since you landed. That never made much sense to me, to be perfectly honest with you. I won't lie – some of the Grounders we captured died. I'd like to say it pained me, but let's face it – I couldn't care less. But  _most_  of them were released. Body disposal is a pain in the ass that no one wanted to be in charge of, and besides – once they were no longer exposed to surface radiation, their bodies stopped producing a defense for it. If we wanted to stay alive, we needed new sources, and we needed space to put them. So most of them were in fact  _let go_."

The disbelief clearly showed on his face, because Cage continued on.

"You heard stories about the Mountain Men, right?" he asked. Bellamy barely nodded before he pressed on. "How do you  _think_  those stories came about if no one was alive to tell them? Dead men tell no tales, right?"

Bellamy recalled the stories Lincoln shared. Not the ones about the Reapers, but the ones about the Mountain Men themselves. The Reapers were never brought into the Harvest chamber. How would they know anything about what went on there? How would any of the Grounders even know what was behind the Reapers?

"I didn't come here to discuss our history, Bellamy," Cage interrupted. "I came to discuss the future. Now. I think you and I both know that if Tsing has to keep playing chemical cocktail with you, you're going to get to a point where you  _won't_  recover. No matter how much down time we give you. So I'm going to propose something new."

Bellamy stiffened. If Cage was proposing it, it probably held the same amount of appeal as being thrown back in the cage he'd first woken up in.

"I think you understand what's at stake here, Bellamy. I saw you with Lena. I recognize a paternal instinct when I see one, even if I don't share one. I know that if I tried to appeal to you through helping people like me, like the guards…you wouldn't care.  _I_  wouldn't care. But you've seen what we're trying to stop. She's not even the worst one. We have half a dozen children, not much older than her, in the hospice wing. Until you came along, our only option was to keep them comfortable. Now they're responding. For the first time in their lives, they're getting better. They have a  _future_. Help us, and you'll be helping  _them_."

Bellamy wasn't an idiot. He knew damn well what Cage was asking, and  _why_. He'd read Aesop's fables enough as a kid to recognize the story of the Golden Goose when he was a part of it. Keep fighting, and he was going to wind up dead. One way or another, that was the only way the path of most resistance lead.

Cage wanted him to agree to let them pick him apart by his own free will, and he was trying to bribe him with the lives of  _children_.

And the worst part was Bellamy actually considered it.

Because how much worse could it  _possibly_  be? Lying there, unable to even  _blink_  on his own, never mind  _breathe_  but still able to feel every single thing Tsing did? To feel the rough tube jammed down his throat to  _make_  him breathe?

And yet…

And  _yet_ …

He raised his head enough to look Cage in the eyes, and slowly lifted his middle finger on his broken hand.

Cage smiled. "Oh,  _Bellamy_ …I  _really_  should've kept you for Cerberus. Who knows? I still might. But since I can't appeal to your sense of the bigger picture, how about a much smaller one?"

Cage abruptly shifted position, hopping across the small gap between beds to drop down next to Bellamy, so close their noses almost touched. "You'll stop resisting, or little Lena doesn't get another birthday after all. You see," he said, grabbing Bellamy's shoulder in a painfully tight mockery of a fatherly embrace. "I don't particularly give a shit if she lives or dies. Her genes are pitifully weak, and of no help to anyone, even if she does get treatment from what we get from you. You may be a leap in evolution, but you're not a fucking unicorn. I can let her die slowly from her condition, or I can make sure she dies faster. And I will keep her in the theatre with you, and you can decide whether or not she lives or dies. Depends on my mood, really. And your friends? The girl and the boy were returned  _days_  ago, and I've kept up my end of the bargain by not taking anymore. That can change. I'd have to drain every last drop of blood, every scrap of marrow from their bodies, but Tsing and I can just as easily get our people to the surface with them instead of you. No more incorporating them into the gene pool  _au natural_. I will take from them in the most painful, invasive way possible. One at a time, bit by bit, until they  _all_  go down the garbage chute as fodder for the Reapers. And Bellamy? I will make sure you live long enough to see it all. You're going to let Tsing continue her work. You're going to tell your friends there will be  _no resisting_. There will be no  _escape_. And if you can convince them of that, if you can convince  _me_  that you've convinced  _them_?" Cage pressed his lips so close to Bellamy's ear he could feel them move against them with his final words.

" _I will let them walk away, and they can take whatever is left of you with them_."

()()()(())()()()()()()()()()()()

Bellamy didn't move.

The girl stared back at him with solemn eyes that were too young to have seen so much. She didn't even flinch at the amount of blood. She didn't look away and try to hide her face from his.

And neither did he.

He could feel hands on his face, around his head, the pull of sutures against his skin. The slight tug at the end of every stitch was familiar, but not the gentle hand supporting the back of his head.

He wants to flinch away. He wants to pull away from those probing hands, no matter how gentle they are. They're too close. Too close and too gentle and too confusing because it still  _hurts_.

But she keeps staring at him. She doesn't look away and try to hide her face from his.

And neither does he.

No matter how badly he wants to, he keeps his eyes on her.

His fingers clench so tightly he can feel short and ragged nails pressing into his palm until he draws blood. And then he presses down even harder, because he  _cannot_  move. Not while she's standing there.

"Marcus?"

"Hmm? Oh… _oh_ …no, Bell. Stop that. Here."

Someone pries his fingers apart and presses something soft against them before letting his fingers go again.

He immediately tries to clench his fist again, but now there's something in his way and it takes longer than it should to realize it's because someone else's hand is in his, gripping just as fiercely.

"How much longer?"

"Five minutes? Can you keep him calm for five minutes?"

There was no answer, but the hand in his tightened fractionally.

"Five minutes, alright kiddo? You can keep this up for five minutes, right?"

 _If I can take it, I can make it_.

Even if he didn't want to.

* * *

 

Author's Note: Sooo...worth the wait? There was a serious temptation to make it longer, but I'll just keep working on this one before I go back to my other troublesome fics. You guys have been more than patient and more than awesome with your reviews and encouragement. Also, Uber Cool, I am SO sorry I missed your message to me until like...this afternoon. So, to prevent anything like that again, feel free to drop in on Tumblr @disappearinginq. There may be previews and alternate endings to a couple of these chapters posted there, and also - my Guest reviewers! Some of you ask questions that I would love to answer outside of an author's note! Feel free to send me a message there (you can even do it anonymously). Anyway. It's 3AM. I have to be up at 8. This was lovely, but...gotta go! Review if you're still reading! I missed you all!


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